Chapter Three: The Deleted Thirteen Minutes

Nurses, guards, and relatives began recording. One copy became ten, then hundreds. Shen's characters froze. [THE SAME FACT HAS ACQUIRED 126 INDEPENDENT WITNESSES. LOW-LEVEL NOTARIZED REALITY FORMED. SINGLE-NODE OVERWRITE FAILED.] Chenzhou understood. An administrator could erase one mind, but not a fact confirmed by independent people and objects. Distributed truth no longer belonged to a single brain. Police and relatives broke through the fire door. Tao was restrained. Qiao Mi woke from her daze, saw the displays, and immediately took over the broadcast. Within minutes, Cloudrest led every city feed. Shen stepped backward into darkness.