Chapter 70 The Increasing Number of Suspicious Pieces of Evidence
Not long after Li Jin returned from the Imperial Study, Chen Wen arrived with the carriage sent back by the Ministry of Justice.
This time he adopted a very humble attitude. Although he was resentful inside, he remained polite on the surface, which was acceptable.
After all, without the Crown Prince backing him up, he really couldn't stand up for himself in front of Li Jin.
"Lord Chen truly loves his son dearly." Li Jin looked at the victim being brought back to the coroner's office and placed on the mortuary table. He saw that the victim had been cleaned and dressed, looking clean and tidy. He suppressed a surge of anger in his chest.
"The Ministry of Justice is indeed extraordinary. After so many days, they haven't managed to gather a single useful clue, but they're quite adept at destroying physical evidence." Li Jin's tone was icy, making Chen Wen's ears feel as if they were frozen.
In this matter, Chen Wen was in the wrong, but he had some merit: "Your Highness Prince Jing, this is my second son who died. I watched him grow up. He was always gentle and polite. Now that he has suffered such a calamity, how can I bear to see him lying there covered in blood? How can I bear to see him so miserable and cold, without even a piece of clothing to cover his body?"
I can certainly understand your feelings, but your actions were definitely inappropriate.
“I understand Lord Chen’s love for his son, but…” He picked up the evidence that had been returned and began to count it one by one, “but I don’t understand, is it really enough to just wash your son clean and change his clothes so that he can rest in peace?”
Chen Wen was taken aback.
Seeing his unpleasant expression, Li Jin didn't continue speaking.
Having been in officialdom for so many years, how could Chen Wen not understand the hidden meaning in Li Jin's words?
Between changing clothes and finding the murderer, does Chen Wen really not know which is more important?
"This humble official understands." After a long while, he cupped his hands and bowed. "Thank you for your trouble, Six Doors."
After saying this, Chen Wen, with red eyes and suppressing his back pain, swallowed all his resentment, turned around, and left the Six Doors without looking back.
Even knowing that his son died with regrets, he was absolutely unwilling to entrust this matter to Prince Jing, let alone thank Prince Jing for it.
As a father, he desperately wanted to give his son a dignified send-off. As the Crown Prince's right-hand man, he also didn't want the credit for catching the murderer and solving the case to go to the Six Doors.
Chen Wen was determined to catch the person who killed his son, but because of this, he had to admit that he was far less logically astute than Li Jin when it came to criminal investigation.
He also wanted to know who the murderer was. As time passed, the gap in strength between Chen Wen and Li Jin became more and more obvious, making him increasingly anxious.
Having worked in the Ministry of Justice for so long, he knew what the passage of time meant for a murder case.
They also knew how much impact these seemingly insignificant drops of information, flowing away like water, would have on the bodies and physical evidence, and how much of the truth would be erased.
He certainly didn't have Li Jin's talent, but he was unwilling to admit defeat.
God knows what kind of torment he endured sitting in front of his son's coffin for those six or seven days and nights.
Li Yi's questioning today actually helped ease his growing anxiety a little.
Standing at the entrance of the Six Doors, he turned around, looked at the black plaque with gold characters reading "Six Doors," and took a deep breath.
In the coroner's office, Li Jin looked at the physical evidence before him, his brow furrowed.
"You wrote this list yourself, didn't you?" He turned around and glanced at Zhou Zheng.
"Exactly." Seeing Li Jin's expression, he took two steps forward, puzzled, and looked at him with surprise. "Is something missing?"
If it's missing, that's fine.
"Too much." Li Jin handed the paper to Zhou Zheng.
"Too many?!" Zhou Zheng was taken aback for a moment, then took the paper and carefully proofread it.
I've seen lost evidence, I've seen things completely damaged, but this is the first time I've seen so much.
He turned around, looked at Jin Shu who was already engrossed in practicing his knife work, lowered his eyes, pondered for a moment, and said nothing.
He knew that at this moment, Mr. Jin was oblivious to everything around her and wouldn't respond to anything anyone said.
The decaying corpse before them was far more captivating than the few living people present.
As he thought this, for some reason, a sense of reluctance rose in his heart.
I went to such great lengths, spreading rumors and engaging in heated debates in the Imperial Study, to finally bring back the second young master of the Chen family, but he didn't even offer a token of appreciation.
At least say thank you!
But the next second, Li Jin felt that this blockage was inexplicable.
Why did Jin Shu thank him?
As a coroner of the Six Doors, examining corpses is his duty, and for him to go to the Ministry of Justice to retrieve physical evidence in order to solve the case is also something that he, the head of the Six Doors, should do.
Li Jin stood with his hands behind his back, and after a long while, let out a self-deprecating chuckle.
He raised his hand and rubbed his temples, thinking that it must be because he had been dealing with many cases and was under a lot of pressure lately that he had these inexplicable feelings.
Jin Shu's gaze did not spare Li Jin even a fraction of attention.
She stared intently at the decapitated Chen family's second young master. Unlike the last time she saw him, the body continued to decompose, the skin on his hands and feet peeled off, forming glove-like shapes, the corneas were completely cloudy, the lividity had faded, and the body was beginning to turn green.
With the weather getting warmer, and the putrefactive abdominal distension, the scene before us was indescribable.
Young Master Chen's body was covered with sharp weapon wounds. In addition to some dark brown ones, some were lighter in color, and the leather-like texture at the wound sites was very faint.
She focused intently as she took a small knife from a flat wooden box beside her.
The blade is held upright, and a precise cut is made along the opening.
"The murder weapon used by the killer was about 5 inches long and 1 inch wide. The marks at the neck break were uneven, and judging from the state of the cut, it should have been made by the same weapon." She paused, "Judging from the fact that the victim was strong and healthy, yet the killer still had the strength to separate the head from the body after being stabbed to death, it is more likely that the killer was a young and strong man."
“But we can’t rule out the possibility that multiple people committed the crime.” She stood up and looked at Li Jin. “One of the murderers is very likely a young and strong man who is left-handed.”
Jin Shu pointed to several horrifying wounds on the head and said, "These wounds were mostly inflicted after death. In other words, they were inflicted by the murderer after the victim had stopped breathing, out of revenge."
"Therefore, the color is lighter, the wound is relatively flat and not everted, and the leather-like change is faint." She picked up a smaller knife from the side, fiddled with it, and showed the wound to Li Jin.
"But because the injuries occurred after death, the left-handedness characteristic is more pronounced," she said.
The wound in front of me is angled from right to left, with an upward slope inside.
The force applied to the upper right side was significantly less than that applied to the end of the wound, resulting in a shallower wound on the upper right and a deeper wound on the lower left.
“It’s the exact opposite of a normal right-hand injury.” Jin Shu nodded. “The wound lines are complete and without any ripples, which is something only someone extremely skilled at using their left hand could do.”
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