The Mystery of the Inner Demon

Chapter 277 Zombies
When Qi Fei brought Zhang Yingdi to the forensic room, Xiao Tao, unusually, came out to greet them through the glass door.

"Only one family member can go in. Who should go?" He looked at the several people behind Zhang Yingdi.

Upon hearing that they were going to identify the body, Zhang Yingdi called several relatives and friends to come and accompany her.

The small passageway leading to the forensic lab was now packed with people.

Zhong Kui made no attempt to hide her disgust, standing alone far away against the wall, coldly watching the noisy scene.

Zhang Yingdi was so nervous that she couldn't speak, and could only hold the hand of a female relative next to her, looking completely lost.

Qi Fei had no choice but to step in and pointed to her: "This is the deceased's mother. Let's take her inside."

"Wait a moment." Xiao Tao, contrary to his usual self, gave a warning, "The deceased's circumstances are rather special, so you should be prepared."

He then led two people inside.

In the center of the cold forensic room, on the stainless steel autopsy table, covered with a white sheet, lies what should be Sheng Tianbao's body.

Zhang Yingdi's body trembled violently, whether from the cold or fear, it was hard to tell.

The moment the white sheet was lifted, Zhang Yingdi was so frightened that she took several steps back, bumping into a metal cabinet full of tools. The sharp sound of the impact seemed to wake the corpses inside the freezer.

Qi Fei then saw Sheng Tianbao's expression clearly and understood why Xiao Tao had acted so strangely earlier.

The condition of the body had changed drastically since the last autopsy. Surprisingly, the body had turned green. Coupled with the collapse of facial skin and muscles, Sheng Tianbao's teeth were protruding from his lips. With his green skin, describing him as having a blue face and fangs would not be an exaggeration; he looked exactly like a zombie from a horror movie.

Zhang Yingdi huddled in the corner, trembling, muttering, "A ghost, it's a ghost, not my son..."

"How could this be?" Qi Fei asked Xiao Tao, puzzled.

“I’ve never encountered this situation before. We’ve already taken tissue samples from various organs for further testing, and it looks like the poisoning is quite severe,” Xiao Tao said.

Qi Fei glanced at Zhang Yingdi, who was already delirious with fright: "Strange, her condition is still okay. The hospital can't find the cause of her poisoning. They say it's very likely that it has been metabolized. Why is Sheng Tianbao in such a serious condition?"

Xiao Tao seemed to have a guess about this: "I detected a large amount of alcohol in his gastric juice. This person drank alcohol before the incident, and the alcohol may have aggravated the toxicity. However, I still haven't found out what the poison was."

As the two were talking, a sudden "thump, thump, thump" sound came from below. Looking in the direction of the sound, they saw Zhang Yingdi kneeling on the ground, kowtowing repeatedly and muttering, "Old lady, we were wrong. Please don't make things difficult for Tianbao anymore. Let him be reincarnated soon. I swear I will keep chanting Buddhist prayers to help you pass on. I will find you a better place to be buried. Please, please..." She spoke incoherently, looking both ridiculous and pathetic in the forensic room.

Qi Fei tried to pull Zhang Yingdi away, but Zhang Yingdi was bewitched and just kept kowtowing, refusing to listen to anything.

Qi Fei pleaded earnestly, "That person last time was a colleague who faked it to tell you the truth, not your mother-in-law Luo Yongmei. The condition of your son's body is due to the unusual nature of the poison you were given. We will try our best to find out the truth. You must trust science." Zhang Yingdi wouldn't listen to him at all, just staring at him blankly, "This is retribution, this is retribution..."

"Alright! You're already here. If your son knows you won't even glance at him, he'll have to come with his mother next time." Zhong Kui said sternly, which stunned Zhang Yingdi. She finally stopped kowtowing, and a bruise the size of a persimmon had appeared on her forehead.

"Since you're here, why don't you go see your son?" Qi Fei, being soft-hearted, gently persuaded him.

With her remaining senses intact, Zhang Yingdi staggered back to the corpse.

Upon seeing Sheng Tianbao's body, Zhang Yingdi finally stopped taking out her phone to film. She wailed in despair, saying that losing her son was like losing her whole world.

Qi Fei understood her grief but found it difficult to empathize with her.

This is what they mean by "every pitiful person has something hateful about them."

Zhong Kui, standing beside him, explained the reason for this conflicted mindset: "When it comes to Luo Yongmei's death, she didn't shed a single tear. Centuries have passed, but some poisons are truly ingrained in people's hearts. In her eyes, Sheng Tianbao wasn't just her son, but also someone to carry on the family line, right?"

"So when Luo Yongmei disagreed with protecting Sheng Tianbao, Zhang Yingdi thought it was normal for her to die?" Qi Fei watched from afar as his relatives carried the disheveled Zhang Yingdi away, feeling an indescribable sorrow. Then, he thought of the victim of her lingering influence. "It seems Zhang Yingdi doesn't know about Huang Ruifen's disappearance. Only Sheng Tianbao and Luo Yongmei were with Huang Ruifen when she disappeared. Now that both of them are dead, the investigation will be much more difficult."
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"Brother Fei, what are you looking at?" Wu Shanqiu suddenly said behind Qi Fei. Qi Fei jerked as if waking from a dream, and almost fell off his chair.

On his computer screen, an AI was asking, "What kinds of monsters have blue faces and fangs?"

"Are you still the Officer Qi who hates superstition the most?" Wu Shanqiu joked.

"I'm investigating the cause of Sheng Tianbao's death," Qi Fei explained.

Just then, Xiao Tao appeared in the office.

"There's a new discovery regarding Sheng Tianbao's cause of death." As soon as he saw Qi Fei, he shoved a lab report into his hand.

Having worked as a criminal investigator for many years, Qi Fei can generally understand the terminology used in most reports, but a new marker appeared on this report: "SulfHb".

Qi Fei couldn't even pronounce the word, and pointing to the words on the report, he asked Xiao Tao, "What does this mean?"

“Hypersulfide hemoglobin.” A rare hint of pride appeared on Xiao Tao’s usually expressionless face. “Based on Sheng Tianbao’s case, I looked up some information. Twenty years ago, there was a case of hydrogen sulfide poisoning in a mine in Puxian County. The autopsy records of the deceased worker were very similar to Sheng Tianbao’s case.”

So I had the laboratory conduct a sulfide test, and it turned out to be true. This is also the reason why Sheng Tianbao's body decomposed faster and turned green. Sulfides accelerate decomposition and react with iron in the blood to form greenish-brown sulfide hemoglobin.

Of course, there's also the question you raised last time: why did only Sheng Tianbao, who was drinking, die? The reason is even simpler, just like how you can't drink alcohol after eating durian. Sulfides are the source of durian's pungent odor, and when sulfides and alcohol are ingested together, they create a fatal synergistic toxicity. The alcohol in Sheng Tianbao's body exacerbated the toxicity of hydrogen sulfide, which was his cause of death.

"As expected of you." Qi Fei praised her generously, but then became puzzled. "There's something strange. It's understandable that a case from over twenty years ago occurred in a mine where there's hydrogen sulfide gas, but these three people were in their own shop. Where did the high concentration of hydrogen sulfide come from?"