Lin Xinyi slowly walked over to Uchida's corpse.
Uchida still lay quietly on the ground. This victim of relentless bullying, who never received enough attention while alive, had finally drawn the focus of the police and the public after his death.
"Gloves."
Like a busy lead surgeon in the middle of an operation, Lin Xinyi stretched out his hand, requesting tools from the officers present.
"Here you go." A young officer hurriedly stepped forward with the forensic examination kit.
Looking closely, it was an old acquaintance—Officer Komatsu, the part-time coroner Lin Xinyi had met earlier that morning.
When Lin Xinyi wasn't around, Komatsu acted as the coroner. But now that Lin Xinyi was present, Komatsu automatically demoted himself to an assistant carrying the forensic kit.
He opened the kit and respectfully handed over a pair of gloves.
"I need two pairs."
Lin Xinyi looked at this hopelessly inexperienced "colleague" with a helpless expression.
"Oh..." Komatsu's face turned red as he quickly handed over another pair.
Lin Xinyi swiftly put on the gloves and then gave Komatsu a meaningful look.
"This time, let me handle the external examination."
"Just take notes in order as I dictate."
"Understood!" Komatsu readily agreed—after all, he had no idea how to conduct the examination himself.
At that moment, Lin Xinyi finally began his work.
He didn't immediately reveal the truth of the case. Instead, he took this opportunity to methodically teach Komatsu how to perform an external forensic examination.
Otherwise, if the police's coroner remained this incompetent…
That would be truly concerning.
There was a standardized procedure for external examinations. By following the steps systematically from start to finish, even if someone couldn't immediately determine the truth, at least all the critical clues would be properly recorded.
"Fill in the deceased's name, location, and time of examination yourself."
"Next, measure the environmental temperature and relative humidity at the examination site."
Lin Xinyi took a thermometer and hygrometer from the kit and conducted the measurements:
"Ambient temperature: 35.5°C."
"Relative humidity: 46%."
Komatsu nodded, quickly jotting everything down.
"Now, let's start with the broad details first."
Lin Xinyi took out a measuring tape and carefully recorded:
"Body length: 161 cm."
"Pale complexion, no jaundice, normal development, well-nourished, no limb deformities."
"No livor mortis. No rigor mortis. No signs of decomposition. Pressing on the muscles indicates they are relaxed."
"Body temperature… We'll skip that for now."
The best place to measure body temperature was through the rectum or liver, but with so many people watching, that wasn't ideal.
"Once we have these, we move on to examining the body part by part, from head to toe."
"Starting with the head and face."
Lin Xinyi retrieved a ruler from the kit and carefully measured the wounds:
"Central forehead: 2.0 cm × 0.3 cm laceration."
"Left forehead to outer left brow: 4.0 cm × 3.0 cm depressed skull fracture, with two additional lacerations measuring 1.0 cm × 0.6 cm and 2.0 cm × 1.0 cm."
"None of these wounds show signs of bleeding, swelling, or tissue contraction. The wounds have a yellowish-brown appearance."
He deliberately paused and turned to Komatsu.
As expected, Komatsu stared back in confusion.
He had practically spoon-fed the answer, yet Komatsu still didn't get it…
"Sigh…"
Lin Xinyi let out a helpless sigh.
"The deceased has a skull fracture, and the facial injuries are concentrated in one area, suggesting they were inflicted simultaneously."
"Additionally, there are widespread abrasions on the exposed limbs, which strongly suggests these injuries resulted from a fall from a height."
"In other words, the victim did indeed fall from the building."
Hearing this, Ishikawa immediately interrupted, his voice growing agitated:
"Then doesn't that prove Uchida jumped to his death?!"
"What more is there to investigate?!"
"Of course, there's more."
Lin Xinyi momentarily abandoned his lesson for Komatsu—it was clear this novice wouldn't catch on anytime soon.
Instead, he turned his sharp gaze toward Ishikawa and focused entirely on exposing the truth:
"Yes, the victim fell from a height."
"But I never said he was alive when he fell."
Ishikawa's face froze.
Lin Xinyi continued coldly:
"I just mentioned it—"
"The injuries on the body match those from a fall, but all wounds show a yellowish-brown coloration with no signs of bleeding, swelling, or tissue contraction."
"These signs are crucial."
"Vital reactions" refer to physiological responses that occur when a living person is injured. If a person is dead when they receive injuries, the wounds will look completely different due to the absence of bodily functions.
"Ishikawa, did you really think your trick was clever?"
"Any competent forensic examiner can check for vital reactions to determine whether a person was injured before or after death."
"And in this case, the victim clearly did not die from the fall."
"His real cause of death is here."
Lin Xinyi revealed irrefutable evidence proving that Uchida had not died from jumping off the building.
He gently lifted the victim's head so that everyone could see his neck:
"There is visible subcutaneous bleeding on both sides of the throat—clear signs of manual strangulation."
"This means the victim had been forcefully strangled before death."
"S-So what?"
Ishikawa had a pre-planned excuse:
"I admit, I did rough him up with Aoki before."
"Yes, I grabbed his neck, but I didn't kill him. It was just an ordinary fight."
He openly admitted to bullying Uchida but tried to separate himself from the murder.
But Lin Xinyi merely gave him a cold smile:
"You think that's enough to clear yourself?"
"Do you really think I only found strangulation marks?"
"If I couldn't confirm the true cause of death, my years of studying forensic science would have been wasted."
He leaned forward again, carefully pulling open the victim's eyelids:
"As you can all see, the victim's eyes are bloodshot with petechial hemorrhages in the conjunctiva."
"This kind of hemorrhage is caused by oxygen deprivation during asphyxiation, leading to increased vascular permeability, capillary rupture, and elevated blood pressure. It occurs within 15–30 seconds of strangulation."
"Furthermore, the victim's face is swollen and cyanotic."
"This happens because strangulation obstructs venous blood flow from the head, causing severe blood congestion and an excess of deoxygenated hemoglobin, turning the face dark blue."
Lin Xinyi's gaze was as sharp as a blade, cutting through Ishikawa's last defenses:
"Everything I just described is textbook evidence of asphyxiation."
"With such clear signs of strangulation, along with postmortem fall injuries, the conclusion is undeniable."
"Uchida was murdered before he fell."
"And finding the killer? That's not difficult at all."
He lifted the victim's hand, showing everyone his fingernails:
"There are clear defensive wounds and restraint marks on the victim's wrists, meaning he fought back."
"And in doing so, he left something behind."
"His fingernails contain skin cells from his attacker."
"DNA testing will confirm exactly who that person is."
"And that attacker likely still has fresh scratch marks on his body right now."
"I…"
Ishikawa's face turned pale as he instinctively covered his arm—where fresh, visible scratches ran across his skin.
"The evidence is irrefutable."
Lin Xinyi's voice carried an undeniable weight:
"Ishikawa…"
"What else do you have to say?"