Chapter 36: Headless Male Corpse (I)

Xie Hui immediately stood up and walked out after hearing this. "Where's the body?"

"The body was brought back by Jingzhao's people. Since it was a murder case, Jingzhao brought the transfer documents and the body together. It is now placed in the morgue and the coroner is examining it."

Xie Hui ran into Shen Yun as soon as he came out of the duty room. There was no need for them to be polite at this moment. They just nodded and went to the small courtyard where the morgue was located.

Xiaoqingshan is just outside the capital, next to the official road. Such a case happened right under the feet of the emperor, with murder and beheading. If the case is not solved as soon as possible, it will show that the Dali Temple is incompetent.

This was probably the reason why Jingzhao hurriedly pushed the case to the Dali Temple. With a headless corpse, it would probably take a lot of effort just to confirm the identity of the deceased. This was definitely not a simple case.

The constable on duty outside the morgue saw the two people coming and hurriedly bowed and opened the door, then closed the door after the two people went in.

As soon as you enter the morgue, you can feel a cool breeze creeping into your body. In order to prevent the body from decaying too quickly, morgues are built in cool places.

"Master Shen, Master Xie."

Shen Yun waved his hand, indicating that he didn't need to bow. "How did the inspection go? What did you find?"

"For now, we can only tell that the deceased was about 30 years old. He didn't have a rope in his hand, so he was neither a scholar nor a laborer. His head was chopped off after he died. The murderer's method didn't seem to be very good. From the wounds on his head and neck, we can tell that it took several blows to chop him off. He died around midnight last night."

Shen Yun and Xie Hui followed the direction of the coroner's finger to look at the wounds on the head and neck. The wounds were not neat, and some even looked like they were torn rather than cut, because the skin was hanging in some places, like a piece of paper that was torn randomly.

Although Shen Yun had worked in the Dali Temple for many years, this was the first time he encountered a beheaded corpse. He immediately felt his stomach churning and had to grit his teeth to prevent himself from vomiting.

Xie Hui also had a frown on his face at this moment. Although he had been to the border before, there had been no wars at the border in recent years, and he would not have the chance to come into contact with a beheaded corpse.

"Can you tell the cause of death?"

The coroner shook his head. "There are no fatal wounds on the body, no signs of poisoning, and no signs of struggle. Maybe the fatal wound is on the head. For the rest, further autopsy is needed to find out."

The two of them just took a quick look and found no special marks or characteristics on the deceased's body that could prove his identity.

The autopsy would take time, so the two did not stay in the morgue any longer.

"Where are the body's clothes?"

"When this body was delivered, it was naked."

The body was naked, and Xie Hui thought the clothes were taken off by the coroner.

When they heard that the body was like this when it was delivered, they both realized the difficulty of this case. No matter how careless the people in Jingzhao were, they would not strip the clothes off the body before sending it to the Dali Temple. Therefore, the body must have been like this when it was found.

There was no head, no clothes or other items that could prove his identity, and no obvious features on his body. It was not easy to determine the identity of the deceased.

Now all we can do is post notices with the information we know now, so that anyone whose family has been missing recently can come to the government to identify the person.

Jingzhao sent the transfer document together with the body. The document said that it was a barefoot doctor outside the city who went to Xiaoqing Mountain to collect herbs and his dog found the body. After he reported it to the authorities, Jingzhao sent people to pull the body back and searched the area roughly, but did not find the head or other things.

There were no signs of a fight or blood at the scene where the body was found, so it can be seen that the deceased was killed and beheaded before being dumped on Xiaoqingshan.

"The murderer dumped the body in Xiaoqingshan because he was not afraid of being discovered, but he chopped off the victim's head, which shows that he wanted to hide the identity of the deceased." But if the murderer did not want to be discovered, there were obviously many more hidden places to dump the body. Why did he choose Xiaoqingshan?

Shen Yun shook his head. There was still no clue in this case. "We need to send someone to search again to see if there is anything we missed."

"Master Shen, let me take people to Xiaoqing Mountain."

"Alright, I'll wait here for the autopsy results. Thank you, Shaoqing, for bringing more people."

The two of them acted separately. Xie Hui took people to Xiaoqingshan to check the autopsy results of Shen Yun and others, and then see if there are any new discoveries, and then ask someone to write a notice.

About half an hour later, the coroner completed the autopsy and delivered the autopsy report.

Shen Yun flipped through the autopsy report presented by the coroner. There was nothing special about it except for one thing that was worth noting.

"Did the deceased have stomach problems?"

"Replying to Mr. Shen, after cutting open the deceased's stomach, we can see that the deceased's stomach is eroded. We can infer that he had stomach problems before his death. And to such an extent, we guess that the deceased must have felt pain frequently before his death."

Shen Yun was shocked. Given the current situation, the stomach disease was a big clue. At least it could help narrow the scope when searching for the victim.

After asking someone to add the stomach disease to the notice, Shen Yun sent out the remaining personnel to visit the villages in the city and near Xiaoqingshan to see if anyone was missing. After all, not everyone could see the posted notice.

After returning to the duty room, Shen Yun looked over the documents sent by Jingzhao and the autopsy report again and again, but unfortunately he could not see anything special.

The victim even had an ordinary build, neither tall nor short, neither fat nor thin. The only thing that could be seen was that he had no scars on his hands, and his skin showed that he must have a relatively wealthy family, at least with enough food and drink.

On the other hand, Xie Hui also led people to Xiaoqing Mountain, which was right next to the official road outside Beijing. People from nearby often came here to collect herbs, firewood, and wild vegetables, so a two-foot-wide path was trampled out in the mountain.

Xiaoqing Mountain is not very high, and the body was thrown casually on a place on the mountainside.

"Form groups of three and spread out to search. After an hour, come back here regardless of whether you have found anything or not." Xie Hui was standing next to where the body was found. The marks made by the people of Jingzhao could still be seen here.

After the troops dispersed, Xie Hui searched for clues nearby, but unfortunately there was nothing here. The weather was dry and not even a footprint was left. If it weren't for the mark made by Jingzhao, no one would have noticed that there was a horrible corpse here.

Xie Hui stood there, wondering why the murderer would dump the body here so casually. If he wanted to, it wouldn't be difficult to dig a hole and bury the body here.

Moreover, not far from here, behind Xiaoqingshan there is a Daqingshan. There are many messy graves there, and the locals think it is unlucky, so normally no one goes there. If you don't want to be discovered, Daqingshan is obviously a more suitable place than Xiaoqingshan.

Why did the murderer choose Xiaoqingshan, which is easier to be discovered, between the two mountains?