Chapter 384: A Case Shrouded in Fog

To preserve any potential evidence, the police didn’t just shovel the snow away. Instead, they melted it carefully, hoping to prevent any clues from being lost in the process.

In the end, all they found were a few sticky, bloody footprints, frozen and imprinted on the ground.

“Tsk. What a crude method.”

Li Jianye mused as he looked at the autopsy report.

The killer was indeed brutal.

They had delivered a fatal blow, stabbing the victim through the neck to immobilize them. Then, as the victim died, the killer had cut a small hole in their abdomen.

Next, they’d reached into the small opening and violently torn out the large and small intestines, along with other organs.

After the murder, they hadn’t bothered to clean the crime scene. They didn’t even wipe away their footprints and simply abandoned the body.

“The time of death was likely the early morning of the 21st, or the night of the 20th.”

“After death, the body was quickly covered by heavy snow, which absorbed the blood. The cold temperatures prevented decomposition, so there was no smell.”

Li Jianye concluded after a moment of observation.

The snow had kept the stench of death from spreading and had also preserved the body from decay.

Besides, the base of a utility pole is a natural place for snow to accumulate.

Combined with the deserted location and the sharp reduction in sanitation workers during the New Year holiday…

…all this meant the body went undiscovered for quite some time.

That is, until two children, rummaging in the snow, found the protruding end of a large intestine and gave it a tug…

…at which point they gleefully decided to take it home for soup or hot pot.

Xu Huo was slightly taken aback.

He glanced over at the shop owner, who was still being questioned. After a moment’s thought, he asked quietly,

“How are the owner and the kids?”

“Any leads?”

Li Jianye shook his head. “The owner closed up shop three days ago. He’s spent these past few days making the rounds for New Year’s visits. On the night of the 20th, he was at a party with friends. He’s not a suspect… unless this was a group effort.”

“The kids’ story checks out.”

“The shop owner’s a good guy. If he has any leftover braised meat, he usually leaves some out here. He pretends it’s for the stray cats and dogs, but it’s actually for those two little ones.”

“That braised meat is probably the only thing keeping them alive.”

Li Jianye relayed the basic information.

There are sanitation workers on duty during the holiday, but it’s a skeleton crew. They typically don’t clear the snow right away, waiting for it to stop falling and mostly melt before they clean it up.

That’s why the body lay here for two days.

“Have we ID’d the body yet?”

“Not yet.”

Li Jianye shook his head. “There aren’t many people on duty at the station right now. We’re still scrambling to call people in, so the search is going slowly.”

“For now, it looks like all we can do is investigate the crime scene.”

It’s always tough to round up personnel for a case during the New Year.

Under normal circumstances, one squad would be enough. A major case might require a whole battalion. We don’t have a battalion available, but we at least have squad-level numbers.

Xu Huo mulled it over. In the end, he decided they had to focus on the crime scene first.

There was no other choice. The records department was practically empty; trying to check files now would take ages.

The crime scene, the place where the victim had died.

The blood spatter was already hopelessly blurred; not even Luminol could reveal a clear pattern.

The body and organs were now with the forensics department, so it was unclear what clues, if any, they still held.

However, given the swiftness of death, there was likely little to find beyond the external wounds.

After mulling it over, Xu Huo finally turned his attention to the footprints.

The killer had left footprints at the scene.

They were bloody footprints, made by stepping in the victim’s warm, viscous blood.

The trail of prints led away from the body and into the distance, stopping only when the blood ran out.

“Size 38 footprints. Height is roughly between 155 and 165 centimeters.”

The footprints weren’t large. With just a quick visual assessment, he had already formed a rough physical profile of the killer in his mind.

“The prints are wide, and the impression is even all around, not lighter at the edges. My initial guess is that the person has wide, fleshy feet. Barring any medical conditions or other factors…”

“…their weight is probably around 150 pounds.”

“Judging by the distance between the victim’s and killer’s footprints, and assuming they didn’t know each other, the killer is likely a woman.”

Xu Huo’s gaze returned to the ground, studying the victim’s last bloody footprints in relation to the killer’s.

“How can you tell?”

Li Jianye frowned.

“As I’ve said before, it relates to our biological self-defense mechanisms. Specifically, the connection between distance and relationships.”

Xu Huo said casually, repeating a point he’d made before.

It’s what’s known as social distancing, or personal space.

Think about it: when a stranger comes to your home, you generally stop about ten feet away before starting a conversation, right?

So, why that ten-foot distance?

Because they’re a stranger.

But if it’s a relative, a friend, or a close buddy, that distance shrinks accordingly.

You can playfully smack your best friend on the butt to mess with them.

But with a stranger, you might not even have the desire to interact.

“The level of familiarity dictates the physical distance between people.”

“Conversely, that distance can tell us about the relationship between the victim and the killer!”

Xu Huo explained.

It was a simple concept, but one that very few people were consciously aware of.

“The victim met the killer face-to-face.”

“Judging from the initial set of footprints, the two of them stopped about ten feet apart.”

“That’s a perfectly reasonable social distance for strangers.”

Xu Huo said, looking at a pair of bloody footprints.