The Genius Female Forensic Pathologist, The Psychological Anatomist - Chapter 62: Mystery of the Haunted House: The Skeleton Gift

Chapter 62

The store manager had other matters to attend to, so he left after Fang Rui and Mu Mian entered the crime scene.

“Dr. Mu, you’re not really here to look for clues, are you? You just like this place, don’t you? Have you fallen for that skeleton bride?” Zhang teased, exposing Mu Mian’s little scheme.

Mu Mian averted her gaze guiltily but insisted, “I’m here to find clues. Haven’t you noticed? When he entered this escape room, he was carrying a bag, but when we found his body, the bag was missing. Aren’t you curious about why the bag disappeared?”

Fang Rui remembered seeing Liu Xiaonian carrying a bulky black bag in the surveillance footage, but they hadn’t found it at the scene.

“Could the killer have taken it?” Zhang speculated. “Maybe the killer murdered him to steal whatever was in the victim’s bag?”

Fang Rui and Zhang spent the entire morning searching the locked room, examining every prop and corpse, but they couldn’t find the victim’s missing bag.

“It seems the killer really did take it,” Zhang sighed.

Meanwhile, Mu Mian was playing with the nooses, even putting her neck through one to experience the feeling of hanging.

Seeing this, Fang Rui quickly pulled Mu Mian away.

“Mu Mian, that’s dangerous. You might accidentally trigger a mechanism and hang yourself,” Fang Rui warned her exasperatedly.

“I won’t be that unlucky. Chen Xue said us Leos would be very lucky this month.”

Unable to find the victim’s black bag, they had to leave the store. As they left, Mu Mian kept looking back, making Zhang suspect that her soul had been captivated by the skeleton bride.

That place was so eerie, could it really be haunted by something?

It was already noon, and everyone was hungry, so they ate at the restaurant downstairs.

Fang Rui finished eating quickly and told Mu Mian and Zhang, “Take your time. I’m going to buy something.”

“Boss, go ahead. I’ll keep a close eye on Dr. Mu and make sure she doesn’t get lost,” Zhang said.

Mu Mian looked at Zhang with a hurt expression. “I have a very good memory. I’ve never gotten lost before.”

“Oh, the point is that I’ll protect you. Understand?”

“Then next time, please just say the main point.”

“…”

A little while later, Fang Rui called Zhang, telling them to meet him in the underground parking lot after they finished eating.

As Mu Mian and Zhang walked to the parking lot, Mu Mian spotted Fang Rui carrying the skeleton bride from afar. Her pupils dilated in excitement.

“Boss, why did you take that thing down?” Zhang asked.

The skeleton bride was about Zhang’s height, made of resin, and not too heavy. Fang Rui brought the skeleton bride to Mu Mian and said, “Mu Mian, this is for you.”

“This is a gift for me?” Mu Mian felt as if she’d been hit by an enormous surprise.

Mu Mian was stunned. It wasn’t her birthday or any special occasion, yet Fang Rui had given her a gift, and it was the very thing she wanted most today: this beautiful skeleton bride.

Chen Xue was right; Leos really were going to be lucky this month!

Zhang was also dumbfounded. He seriously doubted whether the boss had been influenced by Mu Mian. Who gives a skeleton as a gift? But he didn’t dare to criticize, because Mu Mian might actually like it!

“You don’t like it?” Fang Rui frowned. Then why had Mu Mian been staring at it earlier? Had he guessed wrong?

“I like it, I love it so much!” Mu Mian hugged the skeleton, her face full of emotion. “Fang Rui, how did you manage to buy it? I asked the staff if I could buy it, and they said no. They even said I didn’t look like I could afford it. I told them I was very rich, but they didn’t believe me…”

“I’m glad you like it.”

In truth, it wasn’t that difficult to buy. Since a murder had occurred in that escape room, the manager planned to renovate it and was selling off all the props at a discount to replace them with new ones.

So when Fang Rui offered to pay double the price for the skeleton bride, the manager immediately agreed and even offered to throw in the original coffin. Fang Rui declined.

He’d rather not have such an inauspicious package. He didn’t want to be seen carrying a coffin around; it was already drawing enough attention just carrying the bride.

“I like it, I really, really, really like it,” Mu Mian said excitedly. “Fang Rui, I really, really, really like you right now too. Thank you, you’re so wonderful. I hereby declare that you’re now ranked first on my list of best friends.”

Fang Rui’s expression became a bit awkward. He knew that Mu Mian’s “like” for him was equivalent to her liking the skeleton bride, but he still felt there should be some difference between the two types of “like.”

“Boss wasn’t ranked first before?” Zhang asked in surprise.

“Chen Xue said she had to be first. But not anymore. Even if she cries in front of me, it won’t work. Now Fang Rui must be first.”

“What rank am I?” Zhang asked curiously.

“Fourth.”

“That high up?” Zhang felt a bit touched. “How many friends do you have in total?”

“I have many friends, exactly four.”

“…”

“Officer Zhang, you’re very important to me too. You’re the funniest person I’ve ever met.”

“Oh, stop praising me to my face.” Zhang’s heart suddenly blossomed with joy.

They were driving an SUV today, which could barely fit the bride. Mu Mian hugged it the whole way, extremely excited.

Back at the police station, Mu Mian carried the bride, deliberately taking the longest route back to the office.

Along the way, many people greeted her and asked, “Dr. Mu, what’s that? Is it evidence you’ve collected?”

Mu Mian would then answer, “It’s not evidence. It’s a gift, a gift from Fang Rui. It’s the first gift he’s ever given me.”

Then they would look at Fang Rui with an expression Mu Mian couldn’t understand: “Fang Rui, is this what you give to a girl? You should have asked me for advice on gift-giving, I’m quite good at it.”

Mu Mian corrected them: “He’s very good at giving gifts. I absolutely love this gift.”

They all looked shocked. Fang Rui just shrugged helplessly at them.

“Chen Xue, look, this is the gift Fang Rui gave me. I love it so much,” Mu Mian said excitedly as she carried the skeleton bride into the office. “It’s the first gift he’s ever given me.”

“I already know,” Chen Xue said, holding up her phone. She had already heard about it in the group chat, where someone had even posted pictures. She glanced at the horrifying-looking skeleton bride and commented, “It’s very pretty.”

“I was originally going to put it in my room, but since you like it so much too, I’ll keep it here in the office, right next to my desk. That way, when you’re tired from work, you can look up and see it.”

“…Alright.”

“I’m going to buy some pretty clothes for it online, and I’ll get some maintenance equipment to take good care of it,” Mu Mian said excitedly.

Fang Rui and Zhang showed the photos to Liu Xiaonian’s parents, but they weren’t clear about Liu Xiaonian’s social circle. They only knew that Liu Xiaonian had almost no friends.

Fang Rui could only open Liu Xiaonian’s phone and find the person he contacted most frequently.

That friend was also an escape room enthusiast named Li Bin. He used to team up with Liu Xiaonian to play escape rooms often, and they were good partners.

Upon hearing the news of Liu Xiaonian’s death, he found it hard to believe. “Are you sure you haven’t made a mistake? Xiaonian was severely socially anxious and had no enemies. How could he be murdered? Are you really the police? You’re not scammers trying to con me out of money, are you?”

Zhang showed him their credentials and Liu Xiaonian’s post-mortem photo.

Only then did he slowly accept the news of Liu Xiaonian’s death. He choked up as he said, “I really can’t understand. How could someone like Xiaonian, with severe social anxiety and a people-pleasing personality, be murdered?”