Life in North America, you call this an autopsy officer?!
Chapter 368 - 228: Compromise, Mastermind Behind the Attack, Case Clues_3

Chapter 368: Chapter 228: Compromise, Mastermind Behind the Attack, Case Clues_3

Luckily, he was a good man.

It was a blessing for the United States that they could produce a Boss-level Mutant like him.

...

After Chief Flory finished the tasks Brian had assigned, everyone arrived at the CD organization’s branch office building in Cheng County.

Ellie drove off in Chief Flory’s car to take care of the two body bags in the vehicle, as per Brian’s request.

She also needed to report to the Ministry of Internal Affairs on that side about Benjamin framing Brian.

Brian didn’t care about that.

To him, a scientific researcher like Benjamin was just a weakling who could be easily crushed.

All he wanted now was to finish this case early and return to Los Angeles.

Conference room.

With the help of the CD branch staff, various surveillance footage appeared on the projector screen.

There were over thirty different pieces in total.

Some were shot with handheld cameras, some were recorded with special equipment carried by CD staff, and some were captured with vehicle dash cams.

The CD staff here had already been reviewing these recordings, but with the ongoing series of disappearances barely two days apart, progress was slow, and no useful clues had been found in the footage yet.

Brian was in a hurry and asked for all the footage to be projected and played at an accelerated speed.

To ordinary people, the fast-forwarded footage was dizzying, but to Brian, it appeared sluggish.

His strong spiritual consciousness and extensive knowledge and memory, coupled with the perceptual effects of supercomputer perception, turned these thirty-plus projections into a series of frame-by-frame clips, each flickering through Brian’s mind.

Chief Flory hesitated.

This was nothing like the way he’d imagined reviewing surveillance footage.

In fact, with this accelerated method, he couldn’t capture even a single small projection, let alone extract potentially useful clues from it.

This was simply not a normal way to investigate.

Even the CD staff found Brian’s request somewhat puzzling.

That was normal.

The most impressive person they had known was the deceased Krist.

It was right that they didn’t understand.

...

More than an hour later.

Brian rubbed his slightly aching head and said to a few CD staff, "Project number one and number five separately, freeze number one at one hour, thirty-eight minutes, and twenty-seven seconds, and number five at..."

The obedient CD staff did as instructed.

Everyone held their breath and looked towards the screen.

Since Brian had specified so, it indicated there was something in these images.

The first image was from a patrol car’s dash cam, part of the second search team.

There was no choice.

Chief Flory and his team were small-town police and the concept of installing dash cams in cars was foreign to them.

The image was paused, somewhat blurry, but it was still possible to see that it was right after the car had parked and everyone was preparing to get out, captured by the dash cam.

In the image, focused on a bush.

Inside the bush, there was a face hidden, looking like a disgusting, melted ice cream.

The other image was shot by a CD staff member.

The camera was located on the person’s chest.

At the time Brian mentioned, the person was standing on the lake shore, looking towards the lake.

In the frozen image, a shadow lurked beneath the water in the distance in front of them. If you looked closely, you could barely make out that it was also a face, looking as though it had melted...

...

Chief Flory stared at the two images, disbelief written all over his face.

He pointed at the second image, "The first one was captured by the car, and it’s normal that no one noticed since the subject was hidden in the bush. But the second image, the subject is underwater, why didn’t that staff member notice?"

Several CD staff members looked simultaneously at a female staff member.

That footage was captured with her equipment.

The woman looked innocent, "I can’t remember exactly what happened at that time, but I swear, I hadn’t noticed anything unusual, otherwise I would have reacted."

Brian shrugged:

"It’s normal, look at the time shown on the footage.

At that time, the angle of the direct sunlight perfectly matched the position of her eyes, meaning that when she stood there looking at the water, it was all reflective and difficult to see clearly what was underneath.

The filming equipment was different.

It was positioned at chest level, so it captured a glimpse of something underwater.

The female employee realized and nodded frantically, "I remember now, yes, the surface of the water was like a mirror, and after looking at it for a while, my eyes hurt and I left."

An employee played the subsequent actions of the person.

In the footage, the person stood for about thirty seconds and indeed changed location.

This corroborated Brian and the female employee’s statements.

...

Chief Flory, looking at the critical information found in the footage, exclaimed, "I can’t understand how you discovered this fleeting information from over thirty sped-up frames."

"I can’t understand why I am so brilliant either, but we did find a useful clue, didn’t we?"

Brian chuckled.

As an Autopsy Officer,

Brian had seen corpses of various causes of death and recognized at a glance the melted-like facial features as typical burn marks.

The traces of flesh that resembled melting ice cream could be caused by burns and sulfuric acid, but the flesh erosion caused by sulfuric acid was not just that simple; it also produced chemical burns, penetrating wounds deep into the bones, causing overall deformation of the appearance.

The face in the footage looked horrifying, but the bones were normal.

Another point.

The injuries caused by sulfuric acid, with the dual effect of flames and chemical burns, would decompose the biological tissue of the injured area. After the flesh heals, the regrown tissue appears black and brown and also exhibits a noticeable unevenness.

Burns, after the wound heals, the skin and flesh regenerate tissue, appear red, and have streaks of raised growths, similar to Freddy’s appearance in Elm Street.

That was not actually a still photo but a realistic photograph.

Based on these characteristics, it explained that the unknown entity in the footage had previously suffered from severe fire burns.

This information was crucial.

Brian took out a pad and pen, and while sketching, he said to Chief Flory, "Chief, I remember you mentioned before that the lake training camp was closed due to a fire?"

Chief Flory nodded, "Yes, I remember. Two years ago, there was a fire at the camp that killed many children, and the company went bankrupt due to huge compensations, and the leased camp was also abandoned."

As he finished speaking, Brian’s pen also stopped.

...

Brian called everyone’s attention and placed the three sketched papers on the desk:

"The silhouette in the footage was caused by typical fire injuries.

This is the reverse extrapolation of different age portraits I outlined based on the facial bone structure.

Go find photos of the victims and those missing from the camp fire two years ago, compare them, and see if there are any results."

Everyone was amazed that Brian had made progress as soon as he took on the case and nodded continuously.

After printing and copying several portraits, each person took a copy and went down to investigate.

Watching everyone leave, Brian walked to the window, lit a cigarette, and zoned out.

There was still one thing about this case he couldn’t understand.

According to the statements of everyone involved, five missing people, two regular officers, and three CD employees, everyone vaguely remembered the others being there on the way back, and only after returning did they realize people were missing.

Some surveillance footage also confirmed that the missing persons did actually return with them.

At least before leaving, they were in the car.

The car proceeded normally.

How did they disappear mid-journey?

Brian couldn’t figure out how the perpetrator had managed it.

...

"Forget it, while no one’s here, I’ll collect the previous ’obsession gift’ I was granted and see the effect."

Brian shook his head and collected the obsession gift.

Gift One: twelve units of Gift Energy.

Gift Two: one unit of Gift Energy + slight Auditory Enhancement

Brian naturally chose to collect the second obsession gift.

Enhancement of the Five Senses was in progress.

He already possessed enhancements for the nose and eyes.

This time, he was supplementing the ears.

Brian was quite anticipatory of the effects.