Chapter Five: The Type Tower

At the tower's summit, a circular well opened downward. Folders, discarded photos, and broken typefaces rose against gravity from its depths. The rim read: **RECYCLE BIN—ITEMS CANNOT BE RECOVERED AFTER EMPTYING.** Gu Yan's portable drive flew from his pocket and entered a rusted port. A directory tree unfolded in the air. There was the project from twelve years ago: `FIRST_LIGHT_PROPERTY_KEY_VISUAL`. He opened it. Four hundred layers screamed at once. Every one credited Shen Zhuo, but three garbled squares remained in the creator field. Beneath the background, Gu Yan found an object one pixel high: `SIGNATURE_0`. Its thumbnail was not an open circle. It was a hand holding a pen.