Chapter 42: No One Reports the Crime

Prompted by his reminder, the flashlights of the others also swept downward from above toward the base of the swing. Upon closer inspection, they realized that the ground indeed looked quite different. While the rest of the area was covered by a layer of snow of a certain thickness, there was only a thin dusting beneath the victim's feet. Illuminated by the flashlight beams, the dark color of the soil could even be seen beneath that thin layer of snow.

A light snowfall had occurred during the latter half of the previous night, and the snow on top had evidently fallen at that time. The amount of snow was minimal, and as a breeze blew through the forest, it had been scattered somewhat unevenly—thicker in some spots and thinner in others.

Kang Ge walked over to the side, picked up a fallen tree branch, squatted down around the swing, and brushed aside that layer of snow. He discovered that only the topmost layer was loose, while the layer beneath it was frozen solid against the ground.

"It's frozen solid?" Yan Xue squatted down as well, looking closely. "Then it wasn't just swept away; could a snow-melting agent have been scattered here?"

"I suspect it was coarse salt," Kang Ge said, standing up with the branch still in his hand. "First of all, it's relatively easy to buy through many channels without drawing attention. Secondly, after coarse salt dissolves in water, its freezing point drops to around minus ten degrees Celsius. As you just saw, the earlier light snowfall landed on top, and eventually, because the previously melted ice and water seeped into the soil, the coarse salt remaining on the surface was insufficient to continue melting the newly fallen snow. Combined with the sufficiently low ground temperature, it refroze."

"Easy to obtain, unobtrusive..." Realizing what Kang Ge was looking for, Yan Xue found a branch nearby as well. "There are quite a few paths leading away from this area. Let's split up and search."

"Alright. The snow-covered paths are slippery, watch your step," Kang Ge nodded. There was no immediate safety concern here, so he raised no objection to Yan Xue's suggestion to split up. With a brief word of caution, the two of them went their separate ways to search.

There were no strict paths to speak of in the woods; any gap between adjacent trees could potentially serve as a passage for someone to walk through. After dividing their tasks, Kang Ge and Yan Xue meticulously inspected the surrounding area. After a short while, Yan Xue made the first discovery. She called Kang Ge over to show him a small trail she had found, where the snow cover was noticeably thinner than elsewhere—much like the area beneath the swing where the corpse had been left.

"Let's follow this forward and see where the perpetrator left from," Yan Xue said to Kang Ge.

The killer was exceptionally cunning, and their route wound back and forth erratically. Crouching down, the two of them used their flashlights to illuminate the way while sweeping aside the surface snow with tree branches to track the direction. They circled halfway around the small hill until, at the foot of a slope in another direction, they found that the path treated with the snow-melting agent was finally cut off by a drainage ditch.

"Have you noticed that this path treated with coarse salt is getting narrower and narrower?" Standing by the edge of the ditch, Yan Xue straightened up and rubbed her aching lower back. "Could it be that the snow-melting agent they brought ran out and wasn't enough?"

"That possibility can't be ruled out," Kang Ge agreed. "Transporting a corpse all the way while carrying a snow-melting agent as well—it's indeed unlikely they could bring an endless supply. The fact that it lasted all the way here is already somewhat surprising to me!"

"It's a pity there's a ditch here, and we can't tell which way the body disposer went next," Yan Xue said with a touch of regret.

Kang Ge raised an eyebrow at her and smiled. "Too soon to say! Too soon to say! Unless this person grew wings and flew off from here, they had to cross this point somehow! Look at this entire route: they were scattering the snow-melting agent as they walked. The snow fell during the latter half of the previous night, and the temperature dropped then too, which means the scene must have been set up before that.

Although this place is remote, setting up the scene in broad daylight still carries a relatively high risk of exposure. Personally, I lean toward the idea that they came here to set it up after dark. So, tell me, when walking down a steep slope with relatively deep snow like this, would a person walk forward or backward?"

"I think anyone with a normal brain would walk forward. It's a slope, you're stepping knee-deep in snow, and there are trees everywhere—walking backward is hardly safe," Yan Xue felt the answer to that question was obvious.

"Yes, you're right. So as this person walked and scattered the snow-melting agent, they wouldn't just blindly toss it behind them, would they? They must have been scattering it forward as they walked. Consequently, some of it would inevitably end up on the soles of their shoes. Even though its melting effect certainly wouldn't be as effective as throwing it directly onto the snow, it would still leave a trace!"

Hearing Kang Ge put it this way, Yan Xue caught on. Without hesitation, she prepared to jump across the ditch to the other side. Just as she formed the intention and assumed the jumping posture, Kang Ge pulled her back.

"There's no need, no need. Let's not jump over and mess things up," Kang Ge smiled and waved at her. "We'll have our colleagues from criminal technical investigation come over directly later. For you to get across, you'd have to jump the ditch, and the person who dumped the body probably had to do the same. There might still be relatively complete footprints preserved beneath the thin snow on the other side, so let's not go over and destroy them. Come on, let's head back."

Yan Xue felt that what he said made a lot of sense. She nodded, and the two of them retraced their steps, deliberately avoiding the path treated with the snow-melting agent, and returned to the hillside where the body had been found.

After walking halfway, Yan Xue glanced at the "snow-melting agent trail" beside her and suddenly felt a bit puzzled.

"What do you suppose was going through this person's mind? Is this what you'd call a clumsy cover-up?" she asked Kang Ge. "The snow on the mountain was quite deep originally, a vast expanse of white. At a glance, footprints and the like wouldn't really be very obvious. When this person applied the snow-melting agent, they probably couldn't have anticipated that it would snow in the latter half of the night. So tell me, if it hadn't been for that snowfall, wouldn't there have been a glaring, melted path right here? What was the purpose of all this effort?"

"If you're asking for my personal opinion, I can tell you quite frankly that I think this person has an extremely strong counter-reconnaissance awareness. Although, as you said, if it hadn't been for the subsequent snowfall after the snow-melting agent was applied, there might have been a very clear path all the way from the scene to this point, can you be certain that the killer's route down the mountain was heading in one specific direction?" Kang Ge posed a question to Yan Xue first.

"This..." Yan Xue was stumped by the question. On the way here, she had checked the navigation map and confirmed that this area was miles away from civilization, with multiple forks in the rural roads alone. Just knowing one exit point down the mountain wouldn't be enough to determine their ultimate destination.

"So, doesn't that make the answer obvious? A trail that leaves us guessing about the specific destination doesn't expose too much. But if they hadn't used the snow-melting agent, the footprints left in the snow—from their size to their depth—would have given the criminal technicians and forensic pathologists enough to make an objective analysis and deduction of the body disposer's height, physical traits, and walking habits!"

"As a result, this person deliberately applied the snow-melting agent. No matter the type, it couldn't instantly turn snow into a pool of water, so it bought them enough time to leave. Even if the footprints they left behind weren't entirely melted away by the agent, at least a large portion of them were, which is enough to compromise our judgment of their personal characteristics!" Hearing Kang Ge's explanation, Yan Xue also realized this implication. She couldn't help frowning, feeling a dull ache in her temples.

"Don't rush to worry. Let's go back and hear what the forensic pathologist has to say." Although it was pitch black and they couldn't see each other's expressions, Kang Ge was well aware of what Yan Xue was most worried about at this moment. He slowed his pace and gently wrapped an arm around Yan Xue's shoulder, as if to encourage her. "Whether this case is connected to the Cong Fangfang case, we'll find out once we hear the forensic report.

It might be a coincidence, or it might genuinely be linked, but none of that is something we should be feeling anxious about right now. People always leave traces no matter what they do, and no matter how hard they try to erase them, it's inevitable. Furthermore, the more they try to do, the more flaws they reveal—there are no exceptions, it's just a matter of whether those flaws are hidden deeply or shallowly. We will definitely uncover the truth."

"I understand what you mean, but just thinking that these two cases might be related leaves a bad taste in my mouth," Yan Xue said, her mind entirely consumed by the female corpse hanging from the swing and the killer's cunning methods. "It feels as though the appearance of this victim is some kind of mockery directed at us by the killer. It's so infuriating!"

She bit her lip, having nowhere to vent her internal frustration, and could only clench her fists tightly.

Seemingly sensing the tension in her entire body, Kang Ge lowered his gaze, reached out to take Yan Xue's clenched fist, and massaged it with both hands as if kneading dough to help her relax. "Thinking like that is wrong. The female corpse's skin is pale and cyan, and she's dressed in clothes and posed—that's obviously something that could only be done after rigor mortis had passed.

Considering the time interval between these two cases, I'm no expert in forensic medicine, but using common sense to deduce it, the actual time of death for this victim might not have been much later than Cong Fangfang's.

Unless you are some kind of divine fortune-teller who solves cases not with evidence, but by setting up a tortoise shell and a few copper coins to divine the future at home, how on earth could anyone have possessed the foresight to step in and save this victim's life from the executioner's blade in time?"

Hearing Kang Ge put it this way, Yan Xue felt her heart ease up just a little bit.

When the two returned to the body-dumping site, the female corpse had already been taken down from the swing, and the forensic pathologist was conducting an initial examination at the scene.

"Rigor mortis has completely resolved, which means the time of death can be determined to be more than 72 hours ago," Forensic Pathologist Zhang was explaining the situation to Qi Tianhua and the others. "There are also needle marks on the wrists; the method used for bloodletting is likely identical to the previous Cong Fangfang case. No obvious fatal trauma was found on the body's surface, so we cannot rule out that death was likewise caused by excessive blood loss.

The surface of the body was definitely washed, with no residual bloodstains. Triangular brackets were used as supports between the sleeves of the dress and the arms to pose her in this posture. The victim's nail polish should also have been applied after death; the application technique was not particularly proficient, and judging by the smears outside the nail beds, it was clearly not done by the victim herself.

We can rule out the possibility that the victim suffered abuse or assault prior to her murder. Just like in the previous Cong Fangfang case, the killer treated the victim's corpse with extreme care, leaving no signs of negligence or disrespect."

With Forensic Pathologist Zhang putting it this way, it was undoubtedly connecting this unidentified female victim to the Cong Fangfang case, treating them as part of a serial murder investigation. Following standard procedures to merge the cases for investigation seemed like a natural next step.

Kang Ge, Luo Wei, and the others at the scene were entirely unsurprised by this. From the moment they saw that magnificent and intricate Lolita dress, and the even more theatrical swing setup, they had already mentally prepared themselves for it.

Kang Ge informed the criminal investigation technicians of his and Yan Xue's discovery, and they immediately went to look for potential footprints. Due to the use of the snow-melting agent compounded by the subsequent snowfall, the trace evidence recoverable from the scene was pitifully scarce. After processing the area, the female corpse was carefully loaded onto a vehicle and transported back for further examination.

The situation with the person who reported the crime held nothing out of the ordinary; the reporting driver had been nearly frightened out of his wits, trembling so badly he couldn't speak coherently.

This unlucky driver was not a local to W City; he had simply come here on business and intended to drive back through the night to his home in a neighboring city. Passing by this area, he was suddenly struck by a bout of severe abdominal cramps and hastily parked his car by the roadside. Worried about passing traffic, he decided to find a more secluded spot in the woods to relieve himself.

However, after finishing up, in the pitch black of night, he lost his bearings. After walking for a stretch and realizing he was heading in the wrong direction, he turned back. Wandering aimlessly like this, he caught sight of the swing deep in the woods from afar, along with the silhouette upon it.

Startled by the figure sitting on the swing in the dark, the driver panicked, thinking he had run into a ghost, and turned to run. Second-guessing himself, he decided to take a closer look—not that looking did him any good; doing so nearly scared him half to death.

Aside from that, he naturally hadn't seen any suspicious persons or signs.

Badly shaken and unable to drive his car, the driver was currently within the jurisdiction of W City, and the responding officers were all from the W City Public Security Bureau. After a brief discussion, deciding that the driver was in no condition to continue driving, Luo Wei got into the driver's seat to drive the vehicle back to W City for him. Once the man had calmed down and recovered his composure, he could drive himself back to his hometown in the neighboring city.

Several hours after the female corpse was transported back, answers regarding her time of death and identity arrived in the dead of night.

The female victim was named Wang Huihan, 29 years old, and a local resident of W City. Her time of death was estimated to be around three to four days prior.

The ability to confirm her identity so quickly was largely thanks to the fact that several years prior, she had been involved in a verbal dispute that escalated into a mutual brawl, which required her DNA information to be recorded at the time. Consequently, the database match yielded results very swiftly.

Before this, Yan Xue had been struggling to match the victim against recent missing persons reports.

According to household registration records, this female victim named Wang Huihan was married and lived with her husband and parents-in-law. Yet, curiously enough, the victim had been missing for at least four days or so, and even though her immediate family lived right here in town, why had no one reported her missing?