Chapter Seventy: The True Face of the Dark Shadow

  When the black shadow turned around, everyone except Liu Li was shocked. It turned out that this person was Tan Rongjie, who was in charge of the autopsy room.

  Hearing Liu Li's words, Tan Rongjie asked somewhat dejectedly: "How did you know it was me?"

  "It's very simple, because your loophole is the biggest." Seeing Tan Rongjie's face still with some doubts, Liu Li explained faintly: "This afternoon, I asked each of you to describe what you were doing between 1 and 3 o'clock last night, and around 12 o'clock this morning.

  The process described by Chen Si and the other three people is basically clear, although the itinerary of the first day cannot be confirmed. However, for yesterday's midnight itinerary, they all have direct or indirect witnesses to prove that they did not have time to sneak into the crematorium, but only your testimony has no witness to testify for you.

  But last night, when Ren Dongchao, Yang Zhengcai and I were on duty at the crematorium, we indeed saw a familiar figure lurking around the crematorium. The figure escaped into the funeral parlor and then vanished.

  If it weren't for someone who was extremely familiar with the internal structure of the funeral parlor, it would be impossible to hide in such a place. And I, because I had an aversion to the funeral parlor, wasn't very serious during the search.

  Afterwards, I reflected on it and although I checked all the rooms that day, for the mortuary which is the easiest place to hide a person, I only took a glance and didn't thoroughly search, especially those freezers storing corpses.

  I think it's not just me, even if I were to switch with someone else, who would dare to check those refrigerators storing corpses alone in the middle of the night, using only a flashlight, standing solitary in the morgue, opening those refrigerators and body bags, manually checking each corpse.

  It was for this reason that you evaded my search. Now that I know the problem, I will investigate which staff member at the crematorium is most familiar with the morgue, who knows which freezer contains a corpse and which ones are empty.

  According to the division of labor among the five of you, the most suspicious one should be Dong Chengjin. He is usually in charge of managing the morgue and should be familiar with the refrigerators inside. However, he was drinking with his neighbor last night and continued until almost dawn.

  Ren Dong went to find that neighbor in the morning and verified it, confirming that everything Dong Chengjin said was true. Dong Chengjin not only drank but also got drunk. If so, then he couldn't have sneaked into the crematorium and chased us. So he was ruled out.

  Since Dong Chengjin was not suspicious, looking at the crematorium internally, only you who assisted the forensic doctor in dissecting the body and were responsible for cleaning up the autopsy room would have had the most understanding of the morgue, because when dissecting the body, it is necessary to move the body, and afterwards, the dissected body must be put back into the morgue.

  So you are also very familiar with the freezers in the morgue, otherwise, when a forensic doctor comes to autopsy the body, you can't quickly and accurately find the body that needs to be autopsied among the randomly placed bodies on the freezer shelves.

  And I asked you where you were between 1am and 3am yesterday morning, and what time it was today morning. You told me you were at home sleeping. The evidence that can prove you were sleeping is your snoring sound. However, snoring sounds can be faked by recording them in advance with a tool and playing them back when needed.

  Looking at the testimonies of the five of you, Chen Sichai's alibi is confirmed by surveillance footage, Dong Chengjin has a neighbor who can vouch for his drinking, Huang Chuanxin was accompanying someone singing in KTV, and Bai Shancheng was playing mahjong with others. And the testimonies of these four people have also been verified.

  Hehe... However, when the police were investigating your alibi, your neighbor told us something very interesting. That is, they did hear you snoring last night, but after 12 o'clock in the morning, you suddenly stopped snoring.

  Because your neighbors are used to hearing your snores, when they suddenly can't hear them, they're all a bit unadapted, so they remember this detail, haha... isn't the timing quite clever?

  "Isn't that right, Officer? You said the timing was coincidental, but I think it's not coincidental at all. This actually proves that I have an alibi. As you mentioned earlier, yesterday when you discovered the black shadow, it was around 12:00 AM, and my neighbor heard my snoring stop after 12:00 AM."

  My home is half an hour away from the crematorium, even if I start counting from midnight. If I leave my house and drive to the crematorium, by the time I arrive here, it will be at least 12:30.

  "But at that time, the black shadow had already appeared and even took a photo of you. However, according to the timing, I was still on my way there. How do you explain this?" Tan Rongjie retorted.

  Tonight, apart from Liu Li, Wang Mingzhong and Zhang Tao, Yang Zhengcai, as the leader of the crematorium, was also here. When they heard Tan Rongjie's words, everyone turned their eyes to Liu Li, and they were all puzzled by this.

  "Comrade Xiao Tan, you misunderstood a problem. What I meant by 'coincidence in time' is not about where you went after your snoring stopped. But rather... the time period when your snoring stopped should be exactly when Manager Yang called you on your mobile phone."

  After hearing Liu Li's words, Yang Zhengcai and Ren Dongchao flashed a hint of understanding on their faces, while Tan Rongjie was shocked. Seeing the expressions of everyone, Liu Li smiled and looked at Tan Rongjie: "After 12 o'clock yesterday morning, I and Manager Yang chased the black shadow to the funeral home."

  After entering, we found that there was no one, because at that time I suspected that the black shadow was an employee of the crematorium, so I asked Manager Yang to call all the employees of the crematorium. At that time, my purpose was to hope to confirm my judgment through the mobile phone ringtone.

  However, after Manager Yang finished calling the five of you, the funeral parlor was still quiet, although no one answered the five calls, but surprisingly, there was no ringtone coming from the mobile phones inside the funeral parlor. At that time, I had doubts about my own judgment.

  But when I found out that you didn't snore after 12 o'clock this morning, which is unusual for you, I immediately understood the reason, it's because... you recorded your own snoring sound on your phone.

  When you sneak into the crematorium, play the recorded snoring sound on your phone in advance with the loudspeaker function, but when Manager Yang's call comes in, the playback work on your phone stops automatically.

  After Manager Yang's phone hung up, your mobile phone will only show that there is an unconnected call and will not continue to automatically play the recording you set in advance. This is also why your neighbor can't hear your snoring sound after 12 o'clock.

  "If I'm not mistaken, your phone is still at home helping you snore, shall we go to your place now and take a listen?"