Late at night, the only sound on the police communication channel was the rustle of electricity.
Lin Feng stamped out the seventh cigarette butt, and the scarlet light went out clearly in the corridor outside the anatomy room. This is the third "smiling corpse" this month. The bundle of dry straw in the chest of the deceased glows an ominous golden color under the shadowless lamp.
"The surveillance is completely blind, the motive is a mystery, and the only physical evidence is this." He said into the earphones, his voice dry.
The crackling sound of Su Jiu typing on the keyboard came from the earphones: "Boss, the folklore database shows that straw substitute is an ancient witchcraft in the southwest mountainous area, but there is something else mixed with it - I dug out a nursery rhyme deep in the dark web. Twenty years ago, seven children..."
The words stopped abruptly.
The door to the anatomy room slid open silently. Bai Ye leaned against the doorframe, with a piece of straw stuck to her fingertips. His pale face was almost transparent under the cold light, but a strange phantom of a wheat field was reflected in the depths of his pupils.
"Lin Feng," he said, his voice sounding like it was coming from far away from the water, "The last thing the deceased 'saw' was seven children holding hands and spinning in a circle, singing a song."
He paused and hummed a tune softly.
Lin Feng's cell phone vibrated, and a new photo from the Evidence Section popped up on the screen - hidden deep in the bunch of straw was a rusty children's badge with the vague "1996" engraved on it.
"In the summer of 1996," Su Jiu's voice reconnected, with a rare tremor, "Seven children disappeared from the orphanage in the west of the city. The files show... None of them survived."
Bai Ye raised his eyes and looked at the empty corridor behind Lin Feng.
"But now," he said, "something's coming back."
