Chapter 68: The Bizarre Corpse

"Inherited?"

Cai Kun also spotted the handwriting, shouting out immediately.

"Damn it! That Li Yang is truly a piece of trash, failing to make it clear that this car was inherited! Isn't this obviously a ghost-bound vehicle? No way, I'm going after him! I want a refund!" His face flushed with anger as he rolled up his sleeves, ready to go settle the scores.

Seeing his fiery temper, Le Dong actually calmed down a bit, unable to resist a bitter remark, "Cut it out, you can't blame anyone else. If there's anyone to blame, it's the two of us for being careless and blinded by greed. Now look, the registration is transferred, it's all in black and white—it's too late to say anything."

Hearing this, Cai Kun lost all his momentum, wailing with a bitter face, "Then... what do we do? What if this car really is cursed?"

His words once again triggered Le Dong's memory of last night's terrifying ordeal, making his heart beat a little faster. As he pondered how to return or resell the car, Cai Kun—who had just been crying over his misfortune—suddenly slapped his thigh hard.

"Ah!" He spun around and grabbed the silent Ma Wenwen by the arm. "Master Ma is right here! How could I forget about this? Master Ma, please take a look and tell us if there's anything strange about this car! Is it haunted?"

Ma Wenwen was pulled off balance, a look of helplessness crossing his already pale face.

He pointed to his bandaged eyes, his voice laced with fatigue, "I told you long ago, ever since the divine statue lost its power, these eyes have felt worse by the day. They feel quite dull now, and I suspect... I might not be able to see accurately."

"Oh come on, I believe in you! Master Ma, you must have a way!" Cai Kun brushed it aside, assuming Ma Wenwen was just being modest, and pushed him persistently toward the car.

Unable to resist, Ma Wenwen walked over to the vehicle. He first slowly walked around it in a circle, his fingers intentionally or unintentionally brushing against the car body as if trying to sense something.

Then, he stopped on the driver's side, tilting his ear and furrowing his brow, as if concentrating hard to perceive the aura within the car.

This scene made Lin Xun, who had been frequently checking her watch nearby, grow a bit anxious. Just as she was about to remind them that time was running out, Ma Wenwen opened his eyes and shook his head.

"I can't... sense anything," Ma Wenwen said, his voice carrying a trace of imperceptible weakness. "There is no particularly obvious malevolent or evil aura. At least for now, this car feels like a completely ordinary vehicle to me."

"See? I told you so." Hearing this, the gloom on Cai Kun's face vanished instantly as he slapped the roof of the car happily. "Did you hear that, Lezi? Master Ma said everything is fine. As for that inheritance thing, maybe it was just a car left behind after an elderly family member passed away normally! Stop scaring yourself!"

Le Dong opened his mouth. He looked at Cai Kun's excited expression—the look of a man whose alarm had just been deactivated—and then at Ma Wenwen's pale, tired face, followed by Lin Xun's slightly urging gaze. In the end, he remained silent.

He had originally wanted to take this opportunity to blurt out all the bizarre events he encountered while driving last night, but under the current circumstances...

Cai Kun had just relaxed, and Ma Wenwen had declared the car safe. If he brought it up now, he would only look paranoid and make a fuss over nothing.

He had to swallow the words rising to his throat, forcing himself to dismiss the previous night's events as a nightmare brought on by extreme exhaustion.

"Alright, regardless of whether there's an issue with the car," Lin Xun spoke up at the right moment, her tone laced with urgency, "the crime scene is waiting for us over there. Let's head out first, official business comes first. As for this car..."

She looked at Le Dong and Cai Kun, offering reassurance, "Once we wrap up the case, I'll pull some strings and see if I can help you return it."

With Lin Xun's guarantee, Cai Kun felt completely at ease, straightening his posture. "Got it! With Officer Lin's word, I have nothing to fear. Let's get in and go!" He nimbly pulled open the car door and took the driver's seat first.

The car started and merged into the morning traffic. Sitting in the passenger seat, Le Dong looked at the fleeting streetscape outside the window. Though his lingering doubts had been forcibly suppressed, they still pricked at his mind like a tiny, hidden thorn.

Dozens of minutes later, following Lin Xun's directions, Cai Kun navigated the car through several winding turns and finally drove into a dilapidated urban village in the southern part of the city.

The environment here was even worse than they had imagined. Short, densely packed "handshake buildings" squeezed against one another, their walls mottled and stained, with wastewater flowing through the alleys.

Turbid rainwater pooled on the narrow, potholed ground, and the air constantly carried a decaying, indescribable mixed stench.

Cai Kun carefully drove around the large potholes, complaining under his breath, "What a terrible road... What if I scrape the chassis? Officer Lin, where are we parking?"

"That three-story tenement building ahead. Do you see the police tape? Park in the empty space next to it," Lin Xun instructed, pointing to an old building nearby with blackened outer walls and broken windows.

With some effort, Cai Kun managed to park the car. Beneath the tenement building, yellow police tape had already been cordoned off. Several uniformed police officers were maintaining order, while a few plainclothes officers moved around nearby, taking notes, creating a tense and oppressive atmosphere.

A few nearby residents stood at a distance watching, whispering to one another with expressions of curiosity and fear.

As soon as they stepped out of the car, a young police officer hurried over, first saluting Lin Xun with a crisp "Officer Lin!" before sweeping his gaze inquiringly over Ma Wenwen, Le Dong, and Cai Kun standing behind her.

"Mm, what's the situation?" Lin Xun nodded.

"The scene has been kept intact, and the preliminary report from the forensics team has also arrived. We were just waiting for you and... Mr. Ma."

As the young police officer spoke, he gestured with an inviting hand, but his gaze lingered noticeably on Le Dong and Cai Kun, his meaning crystal clear.

Le Dong and Cai Kun consciously came to a halt. Hearing the footsteps beside him stop, Ma Wenwen immediately frowned and spoke up, "They are with me. They can't go in?"

The young police officer looked somewhat troubled. "Mr. Ma, this... the crime scene is quite special. According to the regulations..."

"Let them come along," Lin Xun intervened. "To assist Mr. Ma in understanding the situation. Be careful, and don't touch anything randomly."

The young police officer glanced at Lin Xun, then at Ma Wenwen—who looked sickly yet maintained an unyielding attitude—and had no choice but to nod. "Fine, then please follow me, everyone. Watch your step."

The group crossed the police tape and stepped into the pitch-black entryway of the tenement building.

The hallway was piled with debris, dimly lit, and reeked of stale urine. The stairs were narrow and steep, the handrails coated in a sticky layer of grime, and the closer they got to the third floor, the more pungent the stench seemed to become.

Finally, the young police officer stopped in front of a wooden door covered in small advertisements at the end of the third-floor corridor and pushed it open. "This is it."

The foul odor choked Le Dong and Cai Kun, forcing them to cover their noses and look up.

The room was small and dimly lit. Crumpled balls of toilet paper and used condoms were scattered across the floor.

Against the wall, a dilapidated table was piled with a messy assortment of erotic lingerie, wigs, and cheap optical discs bearing explicit covers.

The entire environment was filthy and oppressive, reeking of the decay and squalor unique to cheap flesh-trade locations.

Lin Xun's expression turned visibly unnatural, her cheeks flushing slightly as she furrowed her brow. The young police officer who led them in seemed to notice and lowered his voice in explanation:

"Officer Lin, because this case is... rather bizarre, higher-ups requested that we maintain the crime scene as intact as possible to assist the investigation. So... none of these items have been moved, and the bodies are still in their original positions. We only performed a basic autopsy and took photos."

Lin Xun nodded without speaking, turning her gaze toward Ma Wenwen. The latter still wore a blank expression, only slightly tilting his head as if listening or sensing something, though his pale complexion looked even worse in the dim light.

The young police officer led them through the outer room into an inner partition separated by makeshift wooden boards.

The inner room was even darker, illuminated only by a low-wattage bulb casting a yellowish glow, and the stench in the air was so thick it was almost palpable.

The officer pointed to a bunk bed in the corner with its mattress board removed. "The bodies are right in there."

These words made Le Dong and Cai Kun's hearts leap into their throats. Following the direction of the officer's finger, they saw three naked male bodies curled up in the shadows beneath the bed frame.

The light was too dim to make out details, but those twisted postures and the skin contours hugging the bone—showing a state of extreme emaciation and atrophy—were already enough to make their scalps tingle.

They didn't look like people who had died just a few days ago; they looked more like shriveled mummies preserved in a museum for years...