Chapter 4: The Giant’s Remains

2022-05-20

It was obvious—the homeless man was Li Cunzhuang, but he wasn’t the killer.

The entire interval took less than an hour. In those final ten minutes, the killer had two jobs: first, clean up the mess Li Cunzhuang left behind, and second, erase his footprints and take away both the wooden board and the chair. Judging by the timeline, just ten minutes after that, the emergency electrician discovered the body.

So, how did the killer erase every trace and carry off the chair and wooden board all within such a tight window?

Are you sure you really see the world as it is? You live in the light, but some people’s work only happens in the shadows. You can’t imagine what goes on in the dark, because that world isn’t yours.

If someone can come and go without a single trace, it’s either because they live in the skies, or they’re deep underground.

“There must be a hidden passage under the tracks, something that lets people move quickly from one side to the other.” I turned to Team Leader Shao and the others. “Maybe we should take another look over there.”

By now darkness had fallen. Team Leader Shao decided to call for backup.

“Xiao Liu, bring more people over,” Team Leader Shao said.

Xiao Liu nodded, mumbling, “We’ve had a lot on our plate lately. We’re stretched thin as it is.”

Team Leader Shao patted Xiao Liu’s shoulder and said, “The bigger your abilities, the greater your responsibilities.”

At this point, nearly everyone was mobilized, and we headed for the scene again.

On the way, Mary said, “If we really find that spot, then…”

I picked up her thought. “Then it’ll be easy to pinpoint the killer.”

Not a single drop of rain had fallen today. The muddy earth on both sides of the tracks had firmed up, no longer the kind that swallowed your shoe with every step. A few hundred meters from where the body was found, we came across something strange—a single shoe print, the right side marked by a deep hole.

That confirmed Li Cunzhuang had left. Someone had erased his prints near the body, meaning if there was a passage, it would be hidden in that narrow stretch of a hundred meters or so.

Team Leader Shao went over the scene again and said, “It was pitch black last night so we could barely see a thing, but now I’m realizing just how simple the killer’s escape actually was. If it had been daylight, we would’ve figured it out right away.”

The earth is round, but when you’re living on it, it feels flat just because it’s so huge. The killer just used a wooden board—walking forward, dragging it behind him. Every footprint got smoothed over, so that’s how he wiped out his tracks.

If you’d stepped back a bit, and if last night had been as bright as tonight, you’d have noticed a long scratch by the wire fence, as though something had plowed through. You could have followed that trail till you found an iron ring hidden in the dirt.

Pull back the iron ring and suddenly, a whole underground world would open up beneath your feet.

Team Leader Shao told some people to keep watch above as we flicked on our flashlights and went in.

It was a dim, musty corridor. The rainstorm last night had turned it into a drainage ditch. The water rose up to our calves and reeked, with dead rats—some as big as kittens—floating on top. If not for the storm, this would’ve still been their stomping grounds.

Water centipedes, each several dozen centimeters long, darted along the surface, sending shivers down your spine.

Team Leader Shao took one look at Mary’s face and said, “Maybe you should wait here…”

Together with Team Leader Shao and Gu Chen, I led the way into the passage. Suddenly, there was the splash of something dropping into the water. Turning around, I saw Mary had jumped in after us.

“What are you staring at?” Mary shot back.

I shrugged and trudged forward, the grimy water swirling with mud and junk. I couldn’t see what was underfoot. Each step felt slick, like I was walking on cotton or maybe the rotting body of something long dead.

The deeper we went, the darker it grew.

A deafening rumble shook the tunnel overhead, thunderous in that confined space. It felt like the whole world vibrated with it. Mary shrieked and toppled backward into the filthy water. I rushed to grab her arm and yanked her out.

Seeing her wide-eyed and panicked, I grinned and said, “It was just a train passing overhead. You’re really that scared?”

Mary wasn’t in the mood for banter. Still pale, she blurted out, “Someone grabbed me from below! There was a hand in the water!”

Her words made my skin crawl, like a bolt of lightning had struck me. Someone had been hiding in that murky water and reached for her? While I was still processing, Gu Chen dove straight under. After a moment, he surfaced holding a hand.

It was a fat, pale hand, bloated from soaking in the water for who knows how long. The skin was wrinkled and white from the fingertips all the way up the arm. I angled my flashlight lower. A head came into view—half sticking out of the water, the rest submerged.

This… this wasn’t a human head anymore. It was huge, big as a bull’s head.

That was the Giant’s Remains. After a night of heavy rain followed by a day of stifling heat, a body left stewing in this airless, muggy tunnel swelled up to monstrous size in just a day. Punch his belly now, and he’d probably spill his own organs out.

“Looks like you swallowed a fair bit of this water back there…” The moment grew sourly awkward, so I shot a joke at Mary.

Mary, clutching her mouth to keep from gagging, heard me and couldn’t hold it in anymore. She bent over and threw up.

Gu Chen hauled the body out, letting us finally see it in full. The corpse had swollen up all over, clothes stretched tight against greenish skin, with blood vessels beneath showing green and purple. He was wearing a uniform, and just by looking at it, you could tell who he was.

This was a railway worker.

One team carried the body to the funeral home for autopsy, while another headed to the rail company to confirm the victim’s identity.

While we waited for the autopsy report, we pumped the water out of the tunnel. If there was one body in there, who knew what else might turn up.

After Mary threw up twice more, the water was finally drained. The three of us went back in, but Mary refused to step foot inside again. With the muck gone, we reached the end of the passage quickly, lifted the wooden board overhead, and realized we’d come out on the other side of the wire fence.

We were on the far side of the tracks—not on the rails themselves.

Another train thundered past in the distance, only to vanish again moments later.

I had the feeling I’d almost put it together, but the pieces were still scattered.

Soon, the autopsy report arrived in Team Leader Shao’s hands. The railway worker had died in the early hours, about two hours after the woman was killed. Cause of death: drowning. His blood was full of alcohol, meaning he drank heavily before dying.

The verdict: accidental death, or maybe suicide.

With the water gone, we found a pile of white liquor bottles in the tunnel. Going by the timeline, that confirmed one thing—in the middle of our investigation, a worker had been drinking down below, leaning against the wall. In the dark and quiet, he fell asleep.

Rainwater crept higher and higher, past his arms, over his face, until he was completely submerged. He died there in his sleep, right beneath our feet, without making a sound.

“Bring back everything from the tunnel. Go over each piece,” Team Leader Shao ordered.

“Team Leader, we’ve identified the victim,” someone said.

Luo Yongjun. Age forty-five, railway maintenance worker responsible for the Western Suburbs line. Every day, he left his tiny shed and walked the rails inside the wire fence, checking all the way to the tunnel before heading back. He’d been doing this for twenty years—could spot a flaw in the tracks with one tap.

“There’s a small makeshift shack out there. We found Luo Yongjun’s work log inside.”