Calling Donkeys Alive

The corpse was found by the police in a sewer, wrapped in a layer of black waterproof plastic bag. The ropes were tied very messily. The police sent it to the morgue, and the bag had already been cut open.

Since knotting of ropes is often important physical evidence during investigation, they are not supposed to be untied from the mouth of the bag. This is common knowledge for criminal police.

When Song Yang and Huang Xiaotao first saw the corpse, they couldn't help but gasp. Huang Xiaotao even covered her mouth with her hand!

The deceased was shaved of all hair, naked, wearing only a pair of underpants. A large amount of skin and flesh was peeled off her face, chest, flanks, arms, thighs and calves. Especially the limbs were peeled to the bare white bones, with not much bloodstain, but some viscous tissue fluid on them.

What came to my mind first was the lingchi torture in the Qing dynasty!

The deceased was peeled to the point of being unrecognizable as male or female. The police who discovered the body said it felt light as a feather when lifting it up, and they thought someone was playing a prank by stuffing an inflatable doll in the bag at first.

I put on rubber gloves, used my fingers to measure the length of the deceased's feet and height, then touched her pelvis, and looked at her teeth.

When I moved to the position of the deceased's head, I discovered a bizarre smile on the deceased's face. This scene made my heart involuntarily tremble a bit!

Imagine this, a person flayed all over like being lingchi'd but revealing a faint smile. What kind of scene is this?

After examination, I quickly said, "The deceased is female, between 25 to 30 years old, medium build, healthy body, no signs of illness or disability judging from the bones. Her occupation was likely a female factory worker in a textile mill."

Huang Xiaotao was shocked by the gruesome state of the corpse. She had been covering her mouth the whole time. Hearing what I said, she immediately asked, "Wait, Song Yang, how do you see that she was a female textile factory worker?"

I turned over the deceased's palms and explained, "See these horizontal calluses? The deceased also has some freshly healed slender wounds on her hands, only people who use their hands to adjust yarn every day would have such marks. Also, her back is a bit hunched, caused by long-term bending over, all these match the characteristics of textile factory work."

Everyone present showed admiring expressions. Huang Xiaotao nodded thoughtfully and asked a policeman, "Have you checked the missing persons in Nanjiang City in the last three months?"

"Xiao Wang is in charge of that!" The policeman replied.

"Find him and ask if there were any female textile factory workers among them." Huang Xiaotao ordered.

"Yes ma'am!"

Then I said to Xiao Zhou who was also present, "You go test two things, one is the source of the ropes, the other is the residual matter in the nasal mucosa of the deceased."

Xiao Zhou was a professional after all. He reacted immediately, "You mean the deceased may have inhaled drugs?"

"There is a smell of medicinal alcohol in the deceased's nasal cavity. You just need to compare and see if it is nitrous oxide, because this kind of anesthetic gas is always mixed with medicinal alcohol to use." I explained.

Xiao Zhou smiled, "Are you sure it is this one? I didn't expect a coroner like you to know these things!"

Huang Xiaotao glared at him. Xiao Zhou quickly nodded, "Alright alright, I'll go right away!"

So he took a sample from the deceased's nasal cavity with a cotton swab dipped in alcohol, and took some fibers from the knotted ropes for testing.

I used scissors to cut open the deceased's underwear and took a look. There were no signs of sexual assault, in fact the deceased was still a virgin. Then I examined the wounds on the deceased's body. At this time I noticed there were traces of being tied up on her groin and shoulders.

I was examining so attentively that I absentmindedly said, "Wang Dali, go buy me some stuff."

When I looked back, I suddenly remembered Wang Dali was not here tonight. Not only was he not here, Wang Yuanchao was not here tonight either.

Huang Xiaotao said, "What do you need? I'll have someone buy it for you!"

"A bottle of best quality vinegar, a small funnel, and some kelp and kelp without sand." I thought and said.

Huang Xiaotao immediately instructed a policeman to go to the nearby supermarket to buy them for me.

While waiting, I used a listening bone to listen to the deceased's internal organs. First of all, the deceased's internal organs and ribs were intact, she was not abused before death. Then I determined the time of death to be about 20 days ago.

Hearing this conclusion, Huang Xiaotao opened her mouth in surprise, "Twenty days? It should have been putrefaction by now, right?"

I smiled, "You even know about putrefaction?"

"Of course! I've read forensic reports a lot, terms like postmortem rigidity, putrefaction, bog mummification, I know them all." Huang Xiaotao proudly swept her brows.

"Then can you explain what is putrefaction?" I asked.

"Putrefaction is..."

Huang Xiaotao couldn't say it for a moment. I explained it to her. So-called 'putrefaction' is a cadaveric phenomenon. After a person dies, bacteria inside the body have nothing to eat for a period of time, and without the control of the human immune system, they start preying on the human body, producing a large amount of putrefactive gases inside the tissues. The body swells up like an inflated balloon.

A corpse in 'putrefaction' can be said to be extremely horrifying! The whole body is swollen into a big lump, the two eyes bulge out, the lips are like two fat sausages, and when you turn it over, there is still a stream of putrid corpse fluid flowing under the skin. If you break the body tissue with your hand, a stream of foul green gas will flow out. It extremely tests the psychological endurance of forensic doctors. If you don't believe it, you can search for it yourself.

The Collected Cases of Washing Away Wrongs records: 'If the corpse has been dead for many days, the head and face swell, skin peels off, lips and mouth turn inside out, eyes pop out', which is completely consistent with the description of 'putrefaction' in modern forensic medicine.

I just didn't want to show off my classical Chinese to make things easier to explain.

The reason for explaining this is not to show off my knowledge. The main thing is I have something to tell Huang Xiaotao later, and before talking about abnormal conditions, she needs to know what normal conditions are like.

Then I also said, "There are three reasons why the deceased did not have putrefaction. First, the muscles and fat on the deceased's body were cut off, leaving little for the bacteria inside the body to eat; Second, the temperature in the sewers is relatively low. Plus the plastic bag cutting off air and water, the corpse can be said to be in a semi-sealed state."

"What is the third reason?" Huang Xiaotao asked.

"I'll tell you later. Look here." I pointed to the ligature marks on the deceased's groin and shoulders.

Huang Xiaotao asked, "Was the deceased tied up?"

"No, the rope was wrapped around the groin for a week. This kind of tying up has no restraining meaning, it's more like deliberately cutting off the blood circulation in her legs..." Speaking to here, I deeply felt that the murderer was either extremely cruel, or extremely twisted psychologically.

"Why do that?" Huang Xiaotao asked.

"Have you heard of the 'living donkey dish'? It is a bizarre and cruel dish. The four limbs of a donkey are fixed with wooden boards, then boiling water is poured on the donkey, cooking a piece of meat until half-cooked before cutting it off, for the diners to eat dipping in sauce. The whole process can be said to be extremely cruel." I saw a trace of horror in Huang Xiaotao's eyes. She probably guessed what I was going to say.

I said, "The process of the murderer mutilating the deceased is similar. He tied her blood vessels tightly, precisely in order to cut fresh meat off her while alive!"

I looked at the disfigured corpse on the iron bed. That is to say, the deceased was truly lingchi'd to death!