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Ashes of Remaining Crimes
墨書 Inktalez
When the fourth charred corpse was discovered, Yan Lan picked up a piece of unburned paper and sneered, "The killer is at Provocation." Jiang Tianxing stared at the twisted "7" scratched into the blackened wall, trembling with excitement at his fingertips. It was identical to the markings found at the orphanage fire scene twenty years ago. In the night, a distant fire flared up; the fifth blaze was raging toward Yan Lan's apartment.
Jiang Tianxing crouched in the corner of the charred staircase, his fingertips brushing over the twisted "3" on the wall. Ashes clung to his fingerprints, resembling scars licked by flames. The number was carved deeply, its edges still sticky with half-melted plastic residue, like some ritualistic marking. The beam of his flashlight swept across the ground littered with shattered glass, reflecting fine strands of blood that dripped from the firefighters as they carried down the charred body from the third floor.
"Is this all the fire investigation team can do?" The sound of high heels crunching over glass came from behind him; he didn't need to turn around to know it was Yan Lan. The hem of her coat brushed against Jiang Tianxing's shoulder, bringing with it a mixed scent of formaldehyde and bitter orange. "The body has been taken away for half an hour, and you're still here playing with impressions?"
Jiang Tianxing tightened his grip on the flashlight, deliberately sweeping its beam over the charred rat corpse at her feet. "Perhaps Forensic Doctor Yan should explain why there is unburned magnesium powder in the deceased's nasal cavity?" She suddenly bent down, her hair almost grazing Jiang Tianxing's ear. "The low ignition point of magnesium powder indicates that the killer never intended to completely destroy the body."
She held up a piece of paper about the size of a fingernail, waving it in front of Jiang Tianxing's eyes. "Look at these serrated burn marks; someone deliberately used an accelerant to create an explosive effect." The edges of the paper glimmered with an eerie indigo hue. Jiang Tianxing instinctively reached out to take it, but she abruptly pulled her hand back. "Don't touch it; the evidence team knows their way around better than you do."
Just then, a heavy thud echoed from the second floor. They both looked up to see a charred human form wedged in the broken staircase gap—half a leg that had been left behind during transport. Yan Lan scoffed, "You fire investigators are just like this corpse—missing limbs."
Suddenly, static crackled through the intercom as Team Leader Old Zhou roared, "Old Xu! The mortuary furnace exploded! There’s a…"
"Number 4," Jiang Tianxing and Yan Lan said in unison. The beam of her flashlight brushed against Jiang Tianxing's profile, casting a long shadow next to the "3" on the wall. At that moment, those twisted numbers on the charred walls of the orphanage twenty years ago burned vividly in Jiang Tianxing's memory.
As thick smoke from the mortuary rolled in from the south of the city, Yan Lan was crouched down collecting carbonized layers from the door frame. She suddenly poked Jiang Tianxing's shoe tip with her tweezers. "Jiang Tianxing, your right pinky is shaking."
Jiang Tianxing did not respond, instead lifting his foot to crush a beetle that had crawled out from the Ashes.
The Furnace of the funeral home exploded, creating a two-meter-long crack, with a half-buried metal nameplate wedged in the charred brick seams. Jiang Tianxing used the tip of his pen to poke at the object, and in the flickering firelight, the words "Ci An" faintly emerged—this was the uniform marking for supplies donated to the orphanage twenty years ago.
"Jiang Tianxing seems quite familiar with this funeral home. Do you come here often?" Yan Lan's voice cut in from behind. Her gloved fingertips traced the scorched marks on the inside of the Furnace. "You went straight for the backup fuel storage without even peeling back a bit of the wall."
Jiang Tianxing turned his back to her, recording the depth of carbonization on the wall, as the nib of his pen punctured a hole in the paper. " Forensic Doctor Yan, perhaps you should focus on the body; there was something in the furnace during the explosion."
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