Forensic work, a profession specializing in dealing with the dead and handling the funeral for the deceased, in the era of no forensic doctor, it would also be the work of autopsy. When they chant sutras for the deceased, they often recite sutras starting with "Nanma", such as "Nanma Amitabha" or "Nanma Guanyin Bodhisattva", so they are usually called "Nanma Master" or "Manya" locally. guy".
In order to investigate the case of the corpse of Jiutian, Zhen Zhen and I went to visit an old man named "Mumbling Zhi". However, when I knocked on the riddled wooden door, what I got was an unceremonious expulsion order: "I won't care about the dead, and I don't want to ask about the living, please come back!"
"We are the police, open the door for me right away!" Zhen Zhen's majestic order was met with ridicule from the other party: "I just won't open it, I have the ability to open the door!"
Zhen Zhen immediately attacked when she heard the words, she really wanted to kick the door when she raised her foot, when I saw this, I quickly hugged her from behind, so as not to be punished by the boss for forcibly breaking into the house. However, in desperation, my hand seemed to be in an inappropriate place—hey, why does it feel so soft...
Zhen Zhen hit my face with her elbow, almost knocking out several of my teeth, from her reaction, I just felt her chest. Although it is separated by the bust, it feels quite firm. If I had known it earlier, I would have touched it a few more times, and I would have been beaten anyway. Her cheeks were as red as sunset, and she would be pretty if she was just shy, but her shyness was full of anger, and she glared at me fiercely.
"You kicked the door, and people will ignore you! If you don't complain, you will be lucky." The thief shouted that catching the thief was the life-saving skill of a flower-picker.
"Humph! I'll see how you trick the door into opening." She angrily stepped aside and kicked the gravel by the roadside with one foot. The poor little stone suffered on my behalf.
I rubbed my swollen cheeks and knocked on the door again, "Hello Zhibo! I'm Mu Shenyu, a detective from the Criminal Investigation Bureau. There was a murder case nearby. I'm here to ask you some questions."
"I didn't say it just now, I won't care about the dead, and I don't want to ask about the living, cough..." There was a violent coughing sound from the door, and the health of the people inside seemed to be unsatisfactory.
"Then what should I do with these two bottles of Erguotou? I originally planned to bring them to you as a gift." When I asked the villagers about his situation, I learned that he was very good at wine, so I bought them from the roadside shop. Two bottles of Erguotou and appetizers such as raw flowers and preserved eggs.
Although Erguotou is not a good wine, it has a strong taste and is more attractive to alcoholics than high-end low-alcohol wine. Just like a person who is used to eating pickles, if he is given precious matsutake mushrooms, he will feel that there is no taste at all.
I unscrewed the lid of one of the Erguotou bottles and sprinkled half of it on the ground. The thick and impure aroma of wine immediately permeated the surroundings, and then I muttered to the good wine people in the room: "Since no one drinks it, I saw that it was drained, what a waste!"
As soon as the play-by-play strategy came out, it didn't take a moment for the door to open. Inside the door was a thin old man with a distinct hunchback. He stood up with his head only between my chest and abdomen. He didn't seem to be in good physical condition. His face was pale and he was coughing all the time, but his eyes were unexpectedly bright. god. After he opened the door, he didn't speak, just stared at the Erguotou in my hand. Although this kind of wine is not expensive, it is not often available for the elderly who live on the subsistence allowances.
I handed him the bottle that I had unscrewed, and he took it without saying a word. I raised my hand to Zhen Zhen and walked into the house.
This is a house that can't be more shabby. It is built with blue bricks and has no decoration. The blue bricks that are "aged" older than me can be directly seen inside and outside the house. The layout of the house is very simple, with one living room, one bedroom and one kitchen. There are only a handful of wooden furniture in the living room, and they are not too "aged", as if they will be scattered at any time.
Zhibo sat at the square table that seemed to appear often in the tavern of ancient TV dramas, pointed to the opposite position, and then raised his head and sipped. He had a hostile expression just now, but as he drank the spirits, his face gradually became more cheerful. From this point alone, I can be sure that he is not the murderer, because the deceased still has ten yuan in his pocket, and this ten yuan is more than enough for a bottle of Erguotou. Alcoholics don't miss a chance to drink.
I sat down and put the appetizers and another bottle of Erguotou on the table, Zhen Zhen stood beside the door angrily, it wasn't that she didn't want to sit, but there was no place for her to sit, there were only two stools in the small living room . Zhibo drank not a drop of the wine in his hand, his face not only did not become ruddy, but even paler, but the cough was much less than before. He unceremoniously unscrewed another bottle of Erguotou and continued drinking. This time, he didn't drink as fast as before. He drank and ate the food and drink. His slightly red eyes flashed with a mysterious light, and he stared at me for a long time before he said: " I don't like to owe others, if you have any questions, just ask, and I will pay you for the wine."
Most people who like to drink are more relaxed. Since he asked me to ask, I would not be polite, and asked directly: "Why don't you do rude work anymore?" Cowardice is a profession with a long history, and there are many rules and taboos. , therefore attaches great importance to the succession of master and apprentice. Although he is over 70 years old and cannot do many jobs that require physical strength, he has experience, and as long as he is willing to teach apprentices, he must be able to continue to gain a foothold in this industry. If you have a clear mind and don't suffer from diseases such as dementia, it is not difficult to work until you are a hundred years old.
He was stunned for a moment, his eyes flashed with a faint trace of fear, but he recovered immediately and smiled bitterly: "It's been more than 20 years, maybe I should keep this terrible experience buried in my heart for more than 20 years. Speak out..." Then, while drinking, he told me the reason for his inappropriate behavior. Although drinking can strengthen his courage, his thin body often trembled in the process of telling—
Being a mumbler is not an easy job. You have to deal with dead people all day long. My parents died young, no relatives, and few literacy, so when I was 10 years old, I followed the master to be a murmur.
I learned a lot of practical things from the master, especially bone extraction. Before the master passed away, only the two masters in this area could do this skill. Later, when the master passed away for a hundred years, I was the only one who knew this skill. In fact, the job of bone harvesting is not difficult to say, but it is not easy to say, the key is to see if you have the courage.
When I took the bones for the first time, I was still very young, but I had been with the master for some time. The time to see the dead was not necessarily less than that of the living, but I was asked to scrape the bones of a rotten corpse with my own hands. , it's really not easy to start. But the master held a stick and insisted that I take out the bones of the corpse, and I would have to be hit with a stick if my hands and feet were slow. At the time, I hated the master, but when I grew up, I understood his intentions. If I didn’t learn this skill well, it would not be easy for me to have two meals in the future.
The master passed away when I was in my twenties, and he had taught me everything before that. Because I am the only one in the vicinity who can harvest bones, many people will come to me first when they want to have a funeral, and sometimes they are too busy with business. Therefore, I lived a good life at the time, but unfortunately I was born with a hunchback, and I was a dead man, so there was no girl willing to marry me...
The reason why I stopped being a murmurer is because a terrible thing happened more than 20 years ago. I still remember very much that it was winter, it was still raining that day, the weather was very cold, and that day I was going to make bones for Liu Po. The bone-cutting must be done at dawn, before the sun rises, and I went with Liu Po's six sons to the place where she was buried - a lush lychee forest.
After the worship ceremony and the burning of incense and candles, we began to excavate the coffin. However, as soon as the coffin was opened, we were stunned. Liu Po's body showed no signs of decay at all. It was the same as when she was just buried. What was even more terrifying was that her right hand was pressed against her left chest, and I clearly remember that her hands were on both sides of her body when she was buried.
Although I have been a murmurer for many years, the situation in front of me still terrified me, and it took me a while to come back to my senses. The six sons of the six mothers were all so scared that their faces were bloodless, and everyone looked at each other, no one knew what to do for a while.
Although I don't know Feng Shui, but many years of bone-making experience have taught me that this must be the place for raising corpses. The six mothers have already changed their corpses. So, I told her sons to get the sticks of firewood and burn the body right away. But it was raining at the time, and it was not easy to start a fire, and I didn't know when the rain would fall. If the corpse was left alone, it was very likely that she would "wake up" when there was a sound of thunder.
According to the rules of bone removal, once the coffin is opened, it cannot be buried again, because the opening of the coffin has disturbed the rest of the ancestors, and if they are buried, they will inevitably have to open the coffin again. Therefore, after the coffin is opened, the remains of the deceased must be properly handled. I suggest to park Liu Po's body at the house of one of her sons and cremate it immediately after the rain stops.
However, none of the six dutiful sons was willing to take their mother's body home. They were all afraid that the mother would "wake up" when the thunder sounded. After discussing for a while, they decided to give me double the remuneration and asked me to take the bones for the sixth woman immediately.
Although I am very reluctant to take bones for Liu Po in this situation, there is no other way. In this thunderstorm, she will explode her body at any time due to a thunderstorm. If she blew up her body because of my hands, I'd be guilty of a big crime.
Dutiful sons need to be avoided in the process of bone harvesting, so I can only harvest bones for Liu Po in the lush and gloomy lychee forest alone. Occasionally, the bones will not rot, so I have prepared the tools for bone removal. As soon as the dutiful son left, I immediately took the bones for Liu Po.
Before this, I don't know how many ancestors I have taken bones for. Compared with those rotting corpses, this time it is much easier to take bones. However, I didn't feel at all relaxed in my heart. Every time the lightning flashed, my heart seemed to be tightly held by an invisible hand, and it felt like I was about to suffocate, because I didn't know if the corpse in front of me would be affected by this. And bomb the corpse.
I first scraped the flesh and bones of Liu Po's limbs, which would make me feel safer. However, in the process of removing the bones, I discovered another heart-pounding thing - the blood that came out of the cut flesh turned out to be bright red! After a person dies, it takes three to five days, and ten days and a half months later, the blood will turn black, but Liu Po has been dead for more than three years, and the blood is still as bright as a living person.
Fear has numbed my nerves, I just want to finish my work as soon as possible and get Liu Po's bones out as soon as possible. I took the bones for Liu Po as fast as I could, but it took me a whole morning to completely remove the skin and internal organs of the limbs and body. In the end, only the skull was left without peeling and scraping the flesh, but this is also the most troublesome in bone harvesting. , the most time-consuming.
It was raining more and more, and although I was wearing a raincoat, the rain still drifted in through the collar and got my clothes wet. Sweat and rain battered inside and out, leaving my clothes almost completely soaked, and my hands sluggish with the penetrating chill. And although it was noon, the sky was full of thick dark clouds, and the lush lychee trees blocked the only light, making it not much brighter than a moonless night.
Under such circumstances, I scraped the flesh and bone for Liu Po's head, and the inflexibility of my hands made me unable to come as soon as I hurried. It took me a long time to scrape off the flesh below my nose. When I was about to scrape it up, there was a sudden bright light all around, and an earth-shattering thunder blasted above my head, making my ears buzz. The terrifying thing happened at the moment when the thunder sounded, the face in front of me that had lost nearly half of its flesh, suddenly opened its eyes, and an angry gaze shot out from the round eyes, as if it could penetrate the flesh, and even penetrate me. soul…
I don't remember exactly what happened after that. I remember that I threw away Liu Po's head and ran in the rain like a madman. I don't know how to get home. Since then, I have drunk myself with white wine every day, so that I temporarily forget that terrible scene, that face that had lost half of its flesh but had round eyes. This kind of drunkenness would last for years until I used up all my savings. The money is gone, but people are still alive, have to eat, and have to live, but I dare not touch anything related to the dead anymore, so I can only do some dirty work. Later, when I got old and couldn't do anything, I only lived on the subsistence allowance given by the village...
During the Three Kingdoms period, Guan Yu defeated Maicheng and was captured by Lu Meng. Later, because he would rather die than surrender, the father and son were ordered to be beheaded by Sun Quan. Sun Quan knew that Liu Bei would not give up easily in the loss of his righteous brother, so he obeyed Zhang Zhao's plan and sent Guan Yu's head to Cao Cao. According to unofficial history, when Cao Cao opened the wooden box containing Guan Yu's head, Guan Yu's eyes suddenly opened angrily. However, in the official history, there is no such thing as opening his eyes. Guan Yu was buried because of the close friendship between Guan and Cao, but also because Cao Cao had an insight into Sun Quan's intentions.
Whether it is credible to say that the first-level eyes are opened, perhaps Fleeting Nian can give some opinions, but whether the matter is true or not, it seems that it has little to do with this case. Although Zhibo shouldn't have anything to do with this case, Yuetong's tests haven't yielded any results. After all, he's been dealing with corpses for over three decades, and he's more or less able to give us a little help.
However, when I told him about the skeletons found on the hillside, he insisted that it was impossible: "It is a fantasy to say that a corpse can be decomposed into a skeleton in nine days. Bone removal? Remember that bone removal is usually carried out after the body has been buried for more than three years and still not fully decomposed.”
"What do you think is the reason for the corpse to turn into a skeleton in such a short period of time? Was it skinned and scraped by someone?" I asked.
"It's impossible. I have done bone removal, so I know very well that although bone removal is not difficult, the process of bone removal will inevitably leave scratches on the bones. And bone removal is like a bone by bone. It's impossible to keep the complete human form after taking it out, and it would be even more difficult to put clothes on the skeleton." Zhibo has more experience in this field than anyone else, and his opinions are very valuable.
"If it's not being skinned and scraped, what is the reason?" This question can make me a big head.
At this time, Zhibo had already drank his wine, and after a moment of contemplation, his face suddenly turned cold, and he said with a trembling voice: "I remembered, something seems to have happened more than fifty years ago..."