Chapter 918: The Tragic Case In The Alley

The crime scene was at the snack street right outside the academy. When the three arrived, they saw the young instructor from Tao Yueyue’s class holding on to a telephone pole while trembling ceaselessly. Chen Shi patted him with his hand, and he shivered in shock, his eyes blank.

"What's the matter? Did you witness the incident happen?" Chen Shi asked.

The instructor nodded desperately.

"Don't leave. We need to understand more about the situation from you later."

The instructor nodded again.

A group of students gathered outside the alley. Chen Shi held up his credentials and asked everyone to move aside for him. The students became more excited instead when they saw that the police had arrived. It was disorderly at the scene, so Chen Shi asked Tao Yueyue to guard the entrance. Tao Yueyue said, "That would be so humiliating."

"You will have to do this kind of work someday. Get used to it!"

Tao Yueyue bit her lip and nodded. Lin Dongxue said, "I’ve already contacted the academy and asked them to send some people over to maintain order. You can just keep guard for a while."

When the two walked into the alley, a strong smell of blood assaulted their nostrils. A male corpse in a military uniform was lying in the dark. The blood on the ground hadn’t solidified yet. Judging from the amount of bleeding, this was the primary crime scene.

Although they called it an alley, it was actually quite spacious. It could probably accommodate two motorcycles passing through side-by-side. The place where the corpse lay had slightly sunken in. There were some leftover building materials piled up against the wall, and the corpse was facing a tall window.

Chen Shi pointed to the other end of the alley. "Dongxue, go and take a look over there."

"Okay!"

Chen Shi squatted down. The corpse was quite terrifying to look at. His entire stomach had been split open, and his stomach bag and intestines were protruding out. The sticky intestines had some sand stuck on them and emitted a foul smell. He could feel warm bursts of air when he placed his hand above it. The deceased’s hand clutched some mud after the rain, but he was lying on his side, with his back against the wall. It seemed as though he had been killed from behind. Then the murderer turned the deceased over and split open his stomach.

Chen Shi took out a wallet from the jacket pocket of the deceased, which contained identification documents, cash, some coupons, campus cards, keys, and a paper with a phone number written on it. The deceased’s name was Sun Lei, aged thirty-two, and his army rank was Second Lieutenant.

He didn't intend to turn over the corpse for the time being. There were a few strings of footprints left on the ground after the rain, and Chen Shi photographed them all with his mobile phone.

At this time, Lin Dongxue came back. "The alley leads to a village within the city, the one directly opposite the academy. There are Internet cafes, small bars, hotels, and the like everywhere inside the village. The layout is rather messy. I found a very big footprint at the entrance and I’ve already photographed it. I also found this."

Lin Dongxue raised an evidence bag with a bloody coarse handkerchief inside. Chen Shi said, "It should have been used by the murderer to wipe the knife. It seems that they had escaped from that direction. Are there any security cameras?"

"Not a single one."

Chen Shi turned to the corpse again. "It's really shocking. Look at the stomach, it had been opened up as if it was unzipped. The murderer seemed to have been quite impatient. When they slashed the knife downwards, they had cut the belt. This could be used to determine the shape of the murder weapon."

"Why did they have to split open his belly?"

"Either they had a deep-seated hatred for him, or it was for some other purpose. Leave the corpse to Old Peng for examination."

𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

Chen Shi took another photo of the drops of blood on the ground. A trail of blood in a particular area caught his attention. It was in the opposite direction of the murderer's escape route. The trail of blood only extended a little over ten centimeters before disappearing. He looked at the deceased's gaping internal organs and thought to himself. Could it be that something had been taken away from the deceased’s body?

Murderers addicted to collecting do exist, but it was rare for people to collect internal organs. These doubts could only be resolved slowly.

"You’re not allowed to go in! Go away!" Tao Yueyue stood at the mouth of the alley, stretching out her arms to block the students from coming in to watch. The students who had gathered outside watching had formed a crowd pushing and shoving their way inside. Tao Yueyue's thin, frail body seemed to be unable to hold them back any longer.

Lin Dongxue went over with her badge and said to them, "Classmates, a homicide case has occurred here. We’re currently investigating it. Please don't watch here anymore. It will only add to the police’s workload. Everyone here is a future police officer. Surely you should have a little self-discipline?"

"Elder Sister Police Flower, who died? How did they die?" Some boys took the opportunity to talk to her with grins on their faces that totally showed that they didn’t particularly care about what they were asking, as they had ulterior motives.

"No comment. Please retreat. A police car will need to drive in later!"