Jung Yong-gil, his expression dazed, took the paper, his face turning ashen as he read.
Just then, the forensics team, laden with equipment, streamed in.
A startled Jung Yong-gil stumbled back, then collapsed to the ground.
“Uh… are we allowed to go in?” the forensics team leader cautiously asked, glancing at Jung Yong-gil. Jeong Rok, putting his gloves back on, simply nodded.
Finally, all the closed doors of Jung Yong-gil’s house began to open.
The forensics team started by examining the perimeter of the house.
Following Jeong Rok’s request to meticulously search for anything that might turn up, the investigation teams began to move in perfect coordination.
“How’s the cattle shed looking?”
“The forensics team went in there too. They should be starting by now.”
Jung Yoon, after a moment of consideration amidst the bustling investigation team, approached Jeong Rok.
“I’ll join them at the cattle shed. I feel like that side might be more promising than here.”
It was merely a hunch, but Jung Yoon’s gut feeling told him this wasn’t the place.
Of course, Jung Yoon, who was a complete novice despite his outwardly calm demeanor, couldn’t be certain, yet he found it hard to ignore. He wondered if something in his subconscious, remembering the contents of the book, was guiding his steps towards that area.
Jeong Rok, who had been heading into the house with the forensics team leader, paused for a moment.
“If anything turns up…”
“I’ll send it directly to you, Team Leader.”
“Don’t let anyone else get wind of it.”
Jeong Rok poked his own eye with two fingers, then spun his hand around to poke Jung Yoon’s chest.
Jung Yoon shuddered at Jeong Rok’s eccentricity, not missing an opportunity to spout nonsense even now.
He took off his gloves and turned away.
I must be crazy to associate him with my brother…
“Ugh… my eyes hurt. Damn, hoo-hoo, ugh.”
The long-unused cattle shed was a mess, from its musty smell to the dust so thick that it was hard to open one’s eyes.
Hangyeol theatrically complained about his burning eyes, waving his hands through the visibly thick, swirling dust.
“Ah… it looks like it hasn’t been used in years, really.”
“Hangyeol.”
“Yes?”
“Are you hungry?”
Jung Yoon, who had been shoveling in one corner, thrust his shovel into the ground and straightened his back.
Hangyeol, who was nearby sifting through branches and dry straw, furrowed his brows, wondering what Jung Yoon meant.
“Because you look like someone desperate to eat dust.”
“Ugh.”
Hangyeol coughed, covering his mouth, then looked around and held out a hand to a forensics team member, asking for a mask.
The forensics member chuckled, took a mask from his vest pocket, and handed it over.
Jung Yoon watched Hangyeol fumbling to put on the mask for a moment, then gripped his shovel again.
Jung Yoon briefly scanned the overturned earth and the undisturbed areas, then resumed shoveling.
The current situation was a result of one of the forensics team members, who was examining the shed, questioning why the ground color looked slightly different.
Jung Yoon sent the eager Hangyeol to another area and focused on digging.
After some time, Hangyeol approached Jung Yoon like a flying squirrel, his voice excited.
“Fingerprints! They came out from the rice cooker and the fence here!”
“Fingerprints?”
“Yes. But one is a partial print, and the other is overlapping, so they’ll have to send them to the National Forensic Service, but they said not to expect too much. Anything turn up here yet?”
“No. First, report to the team leader. We need to check more here.”
Jung Yoon stopped shoveling, feeling something solid.
The forensics team member opposite him did the same. Both their expressions instantly turned grim.
“Hold on, come over here!”
“What? Did you find something?”
As the forensics team member shouted, other team members, who were further away, quickly gathered.
Two more joined to speed things up. Jung Yoon also picked up his pace.
While it could be nothing, he dug with extra caution, preparing for the possibility that it might be something significant.
Soon, the damp soil was cleared away, revealing opaque plastic sheeting.
A forensics team member brushed away the scattered dirt with his hands from the plastic, which seemed to tightly wrap something.
“Is it it?”
The rustling sound was strangely chilling.
Hangyeol, who had finished his call and hurried over, squatted beside Jung Yoon.
Two forensics team members carefully began to peel back the plastic.
The click of camera shutters taking scene photos echoed around the tense site.
Finally, the forensics team member, who had completely removed the plastic, looked at Jung Yoon.
It was a silent request to confirm what they had found.
Jung Yoon immediately stepped closer to the plastic. Hangyeol took out his phone again.
“…This, it feels like this is going to be a big deal,” the forensics team member, with a somber face, added with a sigh as Jung Yoon approached.
“Huh? What is this?”
Inside the plastic that the forensics team member had peeled back, as expected, lay a body.
However, the condition of the exposed body was unexpected.
Given the time that had passed, it should have been skeletal remains, but the body was still un-decomposed and quite intact within the plastic.
“…How?”
“Call the superintendent. I’ll report to the team leader.”
Hangyeol glanced at Jung Yoon, who couldn’t tear his eyes away from the body, then nodded and put his phone to his ear.
Jung Yoon gestured to the forensics team members and turned.
“Alright, here. Let’s start lifting it out from this side.”
“Put that down there. Dae-kyung! Over here!”
Reading his gaze, the forensics team members became busy.
Jung Yoon watched them, then pulled out his phone and contacted Jeong Rok.
[Hello.]
“We found a body here.”
[…Hah. Alright. Send it directly to the National Forensic Service for immediate identification. Ki Junhyeok! Jung Yong-baek’s movements…]
“No. I don’t think you need to do that.”
Jung Yoon tried to stop Jeong Rok, who had been calling Junhyeok on the other end of the line. Jeong Rok remained silent.
Jung Yoon let out a short sigh, figuring Jeong Rok must have roughly understood his reaction, and turned his head.
Soon, the body, carefully retrieved by the forensics team and investigators working together, was fully exposed on the ground.
“This is…”
[…]
“It’s Jung Yong-baek.”
Jung Yoon’s complicated gaze fixed on the cold corpse.
The discovered individual was the very person the Cold Case Team had been searching for.
It was Jung Yong-baek, Jung Yong-joon’s older brother and a prime suspect.
The news of the police swarming in spread rapidly through the village, and the area around Jung Yong-gil’s house and the cattle shed quickly filled with people from nearby villages and local broadcast reporters.
With Jung Yong-baek’s body found, Damhong Village had, in essence, returned to its past.
Jung Yoon finished his search before the commotion grew worse.
In truth, he found it hard to concentrate.
He moved twice as diligently as others to avoid showing his inexperience, but his mind was blank.
He was confused; Jung Yong-baek, whom he’d thought was the culprit, had been found as a cold corpse.
Jung Yoon harshly chastised his reading habits.
I should have read the book properly.
No, I thought I did.
The culprit was definitely Jung Yong-baek, wasn’t he?
He was half-distracted by such thoughts.
A few hours later, after the search began, Jung Yong-baek’s body, found early on, was swiftly recovered by the forensics team.
Along with the body, a few strands of hair and two cigarette butts found within the cattle shed and nearby, as well as fingerprints collected from the fence and feeding trough, and various other pieces of evidence, were transported to the National Police Agency and the National Forensic Service by the forensics team.
After clearing the crime scene, Jung Yoon handed it over to a police constable.
He had received a call to come in for a case report.
At the same time, Jeong Rok and Junhyeok also finished searching Jung Yong-gil’s house and the surrounding area and said they were leaving.
Jung Yoon, now driving the patrol car he had hitched a ride in, took Hangyeol with him and set off for Deokdong Station.
A few reporters were already waiting in front of Deokdong Station.
Their eyes lit up as Jung Yoon and Hangyeol got out of the car, and they rushed forward.
Jung Yoon easily brushed off those asking about the case and led a bewildered Hangyeol inside.
Up on the second floor, Jung Yoon was met with Jung Yong-gil and his mother, who were pouring out their shock, despair, and pain in screams and tears.
Jung Yoon’s steps halted in front of them.
They were people he couldn’t turn away from.
Jung Yong-gil and Go Ok-nam were not in their right minds.
They babbled incoherently, grew angry, and even collapsed on the floor, hitting their heads.
Several detectives managed to calm them down, but they wouldn’t regain their composure in just a few hours.
Jung Yoon approached them, intending to offer some comfort.
However, Hyeoncheol, who was watching from inside the office through the glass, shook his head to dissuade him.
Jung Yoon, hesitant, had no choice but to quietly walk past them.
“De-Detective!”
However, he hadn’t gone more than a few steps when Yong-gil’s hand clutched his leg.
A flustered Jung Yoon held onto the arm of the man who was crouched at his feet, weeping like a child.
“Mr. Jung Yong-gil, please don’t do this. Get up.”
“I… I was wrong. I did everything wrong, so please… Please, my Yong-baek, just Yong-baek…! Heh, I’ll tell you anything you ask. I’ll do whatever you say… please…”
The man who had been furious at the police’s arrival just moments ago was now on his knees, pleading.
He must never have imagined his son would become a victim.
Jung Yoon looked at the man’s thinning, scalp-revealing hair with a complicated heart.