You are now a hospital intern, 1.77 meters tall, right-handed. This is your girlfriend's house, and the entire area you can explore. You can use your phone to ask for help and search for clues. Also, the time of this body is fixed at 8 o'clock; all your judgments must be based on the time of 8 o'clock. Good luck."
The police officer, acting as the guiding NPC, finished explaining the background and left, leaving the contestant with a lifelike corpse. Oh, and a bed covered in blood.
People with a weaker constitution would be terrified by now. These crime-solving enthusiasts are generally braver than most, but when they were actually facing a corpse alone, they still showed instinctive fear.
At this moment, Ren Yifei couldn't appear too 'tough'. He stood at the door for a while, mentally preparing himself, before putting on gloves and walking in.
As if to alleviate his fear, he started chatting with the little fly on the live stream.
"These are all bodies left after death. Humans are not afraid of chickens, ducks, pigs, or dogs, but they are afraid of the corpses of their own kind, especially the corpses of those who died violently. Do you know why?"
Even though the viewers in front of the live stream knew that Ren Yifei couldn't see, they still responded enthusiastically.
"Is it because they feel sorry for each other?"
"Because the manner of his death was too gruesome?"
"Because of some association?"
"Because of bodily instinct," Ren Yifei said as he approached the corpse.
"The evolutionary mechanism is reminding us that there is a corpse of one of our kind here, who died a violent death, and we, standing in the same place, may also die for the same reason. It is our bodies that are reminding us to be careful, that there is something here that can kill you."
At this point, Ren Yifei shuddered: "If this weren't a game, I would never have stayed here alone. Who knows if... what, he's still here, right?"
"What if? What if they're hiding somewhere in this room..."
"Help, stop talking!"
Before he could do anything, the people in the live stream were terrified and started suspiciously observing the background, feeling like something was lurking in the shadows.
Even the event organizers started to think: it might be interesting to hide the murderer in the room.
At this moment, Ren Yifei had already approached the bed, carefully avoiding the bloodstains: "It would be great if you could blur them out. By the way, are there any minors in the live stream?"
"Yes!" The minors in the live stream responded with laughter, and then the next second, the corpse in the live stream was censored with mosaic.
The adults were going crazy: "We're adults now!"
However, it was of little use; all the corpses in the live stream were blurred out.
"Wow." Ren Yifei moved closer to examine the corpse.
Once you get close, you won't be afraid anymore, because the corpse only smells of spilled blood, not the smell of rotting meat, and it can't even attract flies to lay eggs.
The brain then develops a clear concept—this is a model, not a corpse. This realization reduces his fear.
The viewers in the live stream saw Ren Yifei, who had been somewhat evasive before, stand up straight, adopting a "I've always been calm" demeanor, and say, "Actually, there's nothing to be afraid of. It's just a model."
The audience sneered: Then why were you dodging just now?
However, once the streamer calmed down, the viewers also calmed down and adopted a "what's so scary about this?" attitude: "Actually, I was just going along with the background, I'm not scared at all."
"Under normal circumstances, what's the first thing we do when we see a body?" Ren Yifei asked the camera, pausing for a moment before answering himself ten seconds later, "Of course, we call the police!"
"First, approaching rashly will destroy many traces at the scene. Second, a corpse that has begun to decompose in the wild is really... not a good sight."
He chatted idly with the livestreaming fly and began examining the corpse.
The corpse is a high-quality replica, but it feels a bit stiff to the touch, probably to demonstrate the effect of rigor mortis.
"This corpse has entered the rigor mortis stage and has developed livor mortis." Ren Yifei demonstrated the technician's superb makeup skills to the audience, but all the audience could see was a mosaic.
"What's there to censor?" A horror enthusiast slammed his fist on the table in anger.
Ren Yifei was unaware of what was happening in the live stream; he was still diligently describing the condition of the corpse.
"The officer said before he left that this was a 100% realistic corpse, a custom-made version costing tens of thousands of dollars. Even the state after death was completely simulated as a natural death. I have reason to believe that the stiffness and lividity of this corpse also simulated the changes in a real corpse."
There was a smart air conditioner nearby. Ren Yifei glanced at it and saw that the room temperature was 27 degrees Celsius and the humidity was 56%RH, which was a fairly comfortable temperature and humidity.
"Rigoletto takes about four to six hours to spread throughout the body, reaches its peak at twelve hours, and begins to ease after twenty-four hours. Lividity also begins to form after two to four hours, so it can be determined that this body has been dead for at least four hours."
He then pried open the deceased's eyelids to examine the corneas: "Besides rigor mortis and livor mortis, the time of death can also be determined by examining the corneas. Well, it's usually only confirmed after all the characteristics have been examined."
"In such an indoor environment, with the air conditioner and humidifier on, the humidity is acceptable. The deceased's cornea loses moisture more slowly than in a dry environment. However, because the deceased's eyes were open, theoretically, the deceased's eyes would become slightly cloudy six hours after death."
As he talked and looked around, he couldn't help but mutter, "It's so realistic, they really went all out. If I could customize a mecha warrior with this... cough, I'm getting off-topic, let's look at those eyes."
"The cornea has not yet become cloudy. Therefore, it can be roughly determined that the deceased died four to six hours ago. The body's condition is consistent with 8 o'clock, which means she died between 2 and 4 a.m. last night."
"Hey!" He clapped his hands, startling the viewers watching the live stream, who wondered what had happened.
"If this were a real murder, we could determine by now whether the person next to you in bed is the killer!" Ren Yifei said. "By looking at the shape, size, and location of the blood splatters on the person next to you, we can determine how the person was lying down when they died and how the blood splattered onto their face."
The audience thought, "Yes, that makes a lot of sense." If it can be proven that the person who slept next to the deceased was lying there, it can be used to prove that they weren't the one who did it.
But isn't this a game? Ren Yifei, his bedmate, is completely clean, without a trace of blood. This path is blocked.
"It's okay, there are other clues." While the audience was still feeling sorry for him, Ren Yifei had already adjusted his mindset and continued to investigate the case with the viewers in the live broadcast room. "Look, the part of the corpse's lips."
The audience crowded around to look at the screen. The made-up corpse model had pale lips and a bluish complexion, giving off a sense of impending decay.
"They've been poisoned!" one audience member exclaimed.
"It's poisoning from hair. When you're poisoned, your lips turn bluish, and the color becomes much darker. The streamer was clearly showing us the bloodstains around the lips." Even some amateur experts in the live stream noticed something was wrong at a glance.
"Has anyone already figured it out? Yes, it's the bloodstains." Ren Yifei pointed to the wound.
"There were no other obvious ligature marks, blow marks, or wounds on the deceased's body, only a wound on the neck. Moreover, the skin around the wound was contracted, proving that the deceased was still responsive at that time, so it can be basically determined that this was the fatal wound."
"The victim died from having his throat slit. The murderer used a sharp weapon to sever the trachea below the vocal cords and the carotid artery next to it, which is the artery on the right side of the body. Otherwise, the amount of bleeding would not have been so large, and the blood splatter would have been concentrated on the right side."
He examined the wound and couldn't help but praise, "This cut was very clean and professional, without any hesitation."
"Are you wondering why I'm saying this?" Ren Yifei pointed to the wound. "The location and depth of this cut are very clever. Severing the trachea below the vocal cords will prevent the victim from speaking, while severing the carotid artery can quickly cause the victim's death."
"The killer did not commit a crime of passion; he planned and had a purpose, and he had studied the human body. At least he had studied fatal wounds."
"Look here. There's a knife wound in the artery, and the blood is spurting out under pressure. But look at the chin area, it's very clean. It's been covered by something."
He held out his hand to compare, and wow, they were almost the same.
"Wait, let me see this posture." Aiming at the hand shape on the corpse's chin, Ren Yifei carefully covered the corpse's mouth with his left hand, turned his body slightly to the side, and pretended to hold a sharp weapon with his right hand.
"Judging from the shape of the wound, the weapon cut from left to right, so the killer must have used this posture." He adjusted his standing position and bent over. But it still felt awkward.
Ren Yifei glanced at the bed sheet, and an idea came to him. He carefully got onto the bed, straddled the corpse, covered the corpse's mouth and nose with one hand, and held a knife in the other.
"That works now. I couldn't get any strength in my hands with that previous posture."
"If that's the case…" He gestured with his hand, observing the angle of the blood vessel incision and simulating the angle of the splash.
"There should be a lot of blood splattered on the killer's face, especially on the right side of his face." He looked down and saw that there were indeed many bloodstains on the sheet covering the body below the face.
"Looking at the shape of the blood droplets here, it's clear that the blood was sprayed out and dripped down after encountering an obstacle. So my guess is correct: the murderer was in this position at the time, covering the victim's mouth and nose with one hand and slitting the throat with the other."
"Although he was very fast, the blood splattered even faster, rushing onto his face and body, dripping down."
Ren Yifei recounted the scene that should have occurred, and concluded with a comment: "If he had only severed the trachea without damaging the arteries, although the time of death would have been prolonged, there wouldn't have been so much blood. It could be considered both an advantage and a disadvantage."
"On another note, why didn't the killer stab the heart and lungs? That would have been quieter and caused less bleeding. Were they worried about waking their partner? But with that kind of blood splatter, anyone who was supposed to wake up would have."
He got off the bed, and because the blood had already congealed, he was clean and untouched by the blood.
"We know the killer is right-handed, knows a little about anatomy, has strong mental fortitude, dared to use a knife, and is probably about my height, because the blood dripped from similar locations, so..."
'Intern, 1.77 meters tall, right-handed,' he thought of his role.
The smile gradually faded.