The remaining eight singles all live in the mine's single dormitory. There are many old houses in the Chengjialing mine, so the accommodation conditions of the miners are not bad, and there are two small three-story buildings that are separated from more than 200 single rooms of about eight square meters. The absence of group dormitories also determined that the single deceased likewise had no eyewitnesses.

All the deceased also have one thing in common, that is, they all went down the No. 17 well in one class on the sixth day of July, and there were a total of sixteen people who went down the mine together that day, and among the three surviving people, one was Xiao Zhong whom we just met, and the other two were in charge of managing the coal trucks, which means that all the miners who were responsible for coal mining, except for Xiao Zhong, all had accidents later, but the time was different.

Regarding the symptoms of low-grade fever, cold and cough before all the deceased died, Xiao Lei went to the infirmary to check the case records, and also communicated with Dr. Qin, the only doctor in the mine, because the medical equipment in the mine infirmary is very simple, and it is mainly for the first aid equipment prepared for sudden mining disasters, but there are very few daily laboratory equipment. Therefore, Dr. Qin prescribed medicine for general influenza, but at that time, Dr. Qin noticed that the miners had some slight bleeding in the subcutaneous capillaries, but after observing for a few days, the symptoms slowly disappeared, so he did not care.

Hearing Xiao Lei talk about this, Team Cao seemed to remember something, and asked, "Did Xiao Zhong go to cure a cold today?"

Xiao Lei was stunned for a moment, it seemed that he hadn't noticed this problem before, and Xiao Du next to him quickly rummaged through the pile of information. Team Cao waved his hand and motioned for Xiao Lei to continue.

In the past two days, Xiao Lei and the others have checked the background checks of all the deceased. Chengjialing Mine was originally the county's tertiary industry, 96 years of restructuring, into a private enterprise, Dai Mine Director was the mine production director before the restructuring, after the restructuring, was hired as the mine manager. The legal person of Chengjialing Mine is a coal boss in Yangquan, very powerful, there are four or five mines in hand, Chengjialing Mine is the lowest output one, naturally it is not too important, once or twice a year, the daily work is handed over to Dai Mine Manager, and he is not too involved. The employees are basically miners before the restructuring, except for more than a dozen people in the finance and sales and transportation departments, there are no expatriate employees.

In addition, the location of the Chengjialing mine is very closed, and there are very few people in and out of the town, and there are only six or seven hundred miners in the town plus their families, and there are some farmers who farm land and raise sheep, businessmen who open small restaurants and shops, plus retired workers, a total of less than 1,000 people.

Six or seven of the dozen or so dead were not locals, but most of them had been working in the mine for four or five years, and there was no conflict between them. The life of the miners is very monotonous, except for going down the mine, they usually get together to play cards and watch TV to kill time, because it takes more than an hour to walk by car from the nearest county seat, except for the New Year's holidays, the miners hardly leave the town.

Such a closed environment can basically rule out the possibility of human crimes.

The investigation of the scene, Xiao Lei did not make any new discoveries, the previous investigation report of the criminal police team was very detailed, and Xiao Lei did not explain too much. It was only mentioned that they measured the area of the fire in detail, regardless of the location of the fire, what the surrounding environment was, whether there were flammable items, the area was about the same, a circle about one meter in diameter. Whatever is inside the circle, nothing is burned, and outside the circle, even flammable materials such as wood and paper are intact.

Especially at the fire scene in the bathhouse, the rain faucet was on, and it was still not affected by the water, and it was still a circle of about one meter.

When Xiao Lei said this, Xiao Du on the side took a piece of paper, looked back and forth, and interjected, "Team Cao, that Xiao Zhong also went to the infirmary to see a doctor, and it seems to be the most seriously ill one, he has been infused with liquid for five days in a row, and he has also been injected with penicillin, and the other miners have just prescribed some medicine." ”

Team Cao nodded, and did not dwell on this issue, but asked Xiao Lei: "How is it, after checking for a few days, what do you think?"

Xiao Lei shook his head, his brows furrowed. "Team Cao, there is no progress, it is neither a homicide nor a suicide, it is more like an accident, but so many people have this accident at the same time, it doesn't make sense. The comrades of the Provincial Criminal Police Brigade believe that it was a spontaneous combustion of the human body, but I checked some information before I came, and I am afraid that this statement is untenable. ”

"There are more and more detailed records of spontaneous combustion incidents in foreign countries, but after I checked, I found that they were all isolated incidents, and there had never been a situation where multiple cases occurred in the same place at the same time. Moreover, in foreign cases, there are both men and women who are killed, and there are more women, but the thirteen people killed in Chengjialing are all men, which does not make sense. ”

"Foreign studies believe that there are three possibilities for spontaneous combustion of the human body, one is called human candle, which means that the human body is partially heated, or because of the influence of open flame or electric shock, causing fat to burn slowly, but in this way, it takes a long time to burn out a corpse. Another theory is called thermal radiation, which means that sunlight is focused under special atmospheric conditions, producing high-energy thermal radiation, and the object is heated to a very high temperature in a very short time, and if it shines on a person, it will naturally be vaporized immediately. ”

"The third theory, called ball lightning, is that there is a kind of ball lightning in nature, which has an extremely high voltage, carries a huge amount of energy, and is erratic, and can also enter the room along the wire. When it hits the human body, the person is also instantly scorched. However, these three statements are obviously different from the incident that occurred in Chengjialing, and we also checked the files of the local public security department. ”

After talking about this paragraph, Xiao Lei paused for a moment and added: "I personally think that what we encountered may be an extremely rare and special natural phenomenon, and its appearance must be related to the No. 17 mine. ”

After listening to Xiao Lei's introduction, Team Cao nodded, but turned his face and said to me: "Lao Chang, what do you think of the coal essence that Lao Li said before?"

I didn't expect that listening to Xiao Lei's introduction to the case, how could Team Cao suddenly run to the matter of coal spirit, thought about it, and said slowly: "That old Li said about the coal spirit, to be honest, today is also the first time I heard it, from his description, the coal spirit does not look like a ghost, but like some kind of life, because it obviously has the ability to think actively, and its behavior is also controlled by thinking." But what I want to say is another issue, and that is the issue of mine closures. ”

"As far as I know, it is very rare for a coal mine to be closed in the middle of the road, and most of the cases are caused by war, explosions, and fire accidents. Chengjialing mine was excavated in the Yuan Dynasty, the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties were on the western slope of Chengjialing for hundreds of years, and the mine was closed during the Qing Daoguang period. Although the Daoguang Qing Empire has gone downhill, it is still peaceful, especially in Shanxi, where industry and commerce are more developed and there is little turmoil, which may only be due to the closure of mines caused by accidents. ”

"But just now Lao Li didn't know the reason for the closure of the mine, as he introduced, his ancestors were miners for five or six generations, and there was no rumor about the reason for the closure of the mine, isn't it strange?

"In the Republic of China, the mine moved to Dongpo. According to Lao Li, No. 1 to No. 10 mines were blown up by the Japanese. But we should note that Japan's surrender was caused by two atomic bombs dropped by the United States, and it was actually very sudden. Before the atomic bomb was dropped, Japan had no intention of surrendering, and the Japanese mainland was still preparing for landing defense, and the Japanese-occupied areas of China resisted intermittently for several months after the Emperor's Shoshu was promulgated. ”

Therefore, Lao Li said that Japan blew up the mine half a year before its surrender, and it was not because of the defeat. Japan spared no effort in plundering the resources of the Japanese theater of operations, and iron ore and coal were all mined and transported to the northeast, which were the most important strategic materials, and if the coal was not dug up, it would not be abandoned, and even if it was dug up, it would be good to discard it, so why should they use so many explosives to blow up the mines? Could it be that the Japanese found something in the mines? What are they deliberately covering up?

"So, Team Cao, I think we should prepare to go down the mine on the one hand and investigate the situation underground in detail, and on the other hand, it is necessary to go to the county cultural center and archives to increase the investigation to understand the real reasons for the closure of the mine in Chengjialing several times, and to see if there are any written records of similar deaths. ”

"In addition, the miner Xiao Zhong, we have to take a closer look, why he has the same fever as the victim, but he is unharmed?"

After listening to my words, Team Cao nodded and asked in a low voice, "Lao Chang, do you think that coal spirit could be the drought that we ran into in the western suburbs hospital back then?"

I shook my head, "No, it's very rare for a drought to be possessed, I don't think there will be so many drought fish possessing thirteen people at the same time, don't forget, the same sex repels each other, the opposite sex attracts, it is impossible for the drought fish to get together, and they can be safe." ”

"What's the matter today? Team Cao, how can you, a staunch materialist, lead me to the matter of ghosts and gods?" I reacted suddenly, and asked Team Cao with a smile.

(The avenue is sloppy, and it can be left and right.) All things are born without giving up, and they are not succeeding. Clothing all things without being the Lord, and always having no desire, can be called small, and all things are returned to the Lord without the Lord, but can be called great. It is not big in the end, so it can become great - "Tao Te Ching")